aJL. 


BESIDE 
LAKE  BEAUTIFUL 


BY 

WILLIAM  A.  QUAYLE 


THE    ABINGDON    PRESS 


COPYRIGHT,    1914,   BY 
WILLIAM  A.  QUAYLE 


oc 


/ 


Contents 


PAGE 

THE  JOY  FOREVER,    -        -        -        -        -  11 

A  GREAT  WATER,  19 

A  SUMMER  SEA,         -----  27 

STAYING  ON  THE  TOP  OF  THE  WATER,  33 

OUR  PISCATORIAL  ORIGIN,  45 

OUR  RIVER,    -  53 

THE  SAND  DUNES,     -----  73 

THE  RIVER  MEADOW,    -  87 

THE  LILY  POND,  95 

THE  PINE  FOREST,         -        -        -        -  101 

FOLKS, -  107 

WHERE  WE  SNUGGLE  DOWN,        -        -  115 

THE  SILENT  CHIMES,                                   -  125 

ANOTHER  RIVER,    -----  135 

THE  LAKE  MEADOW,         ..,--•-  157 
5 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

DAYS  OF  IDLENESS,        -        -                -  163 

THE  BELOVEDS,          -        -        -     .   -  -  167 

GADDING  ABOUT,    -  171 

MY  BOATS, -  177 

THE  GAYLE,    -  182 

THE  PRAIRIE,  -  196 

THE  SNUG,      -        -        -  .      -  202 

THE  PETREL,       -        *        -  -  206 

SUMMER  ANGER, 215 

LAKE  TERRIBLE, 225 

LAKE  BEAUTIFUL,           -  237 


Index  to  Pictures  and  Artists 


PAGE 

WHERE  WE  SNUGGLE  DOWN..  .  .Miss  Smith.  .  Frontispiece 


THE  BEECH  WOODS  

Cable  

13 

OUR  RIVER  

Parmenter  .  .  . 

15 

"SUNSET  AND  EVENING  STAR".  . 

Harned  

16 

L\KE  TERRIBLE 

Parmenter 

17 

WISTFUL  

Quayle  

19 

MEETING  OF  THE  WATERS 

Parmenter 

21 

WAITING  

Quayle  

23 

IN  PORT 

Cable  . 

25 

THE  GOOD-NIGHT  Kiss  

Harned  

27 

THE  Music  OF  THE  WATERS.  .  .  . 

Parmenter  .  .  . 

29 

GYPSYING  WITH  THE  WIND  

Hansen  

30 

THE  SOLITARY  VOYAGER  

Quayle  

32 

THE  WISTFUL  SUNSET  

Quayle  

34 

Two  LOVERS  OF  THE  RIVER  .... 

Parmenter  .  .  . 

35 

THE  FOLDED  OARS  

Quayle  

36 

THE  WAITING  OAR  

Quayle  

39 

SPRING  WONDER 

Pilling 

42 

CAUGHT  NAPPING 

Parmenter  .  .  . 

43 

MAROONED  

Parmenter  .  .  . 

45 

THE  SINGING  BOUGHS  

Hansen  

47 

SEA-BORN  

Smith  

49 

"WHISPERING  HOPE"  

Parmenter  .  .  . 

51 

THE  LOITERING  STREAM  

Parmenter.  .  . 

53 

UP  STREAM  

.  .  Parmenter  .  .  . 

55 

THE  REEDS  .  .  . 

.Parmenter  .  .  , 

57 

INDEX  TO  PICTURES  AND  ARTISTS 

PAGE 

THE  RUSHES Parmenter ...  59 

SINGING  TOWARD  THE  LAKE Hansen 60 

THE  GUARDSMEN Parmenter ...  63 

LIKE  SUNSET  IN  A  LAND  OF  REEDS  .  . .  Parmenter ...  65 

THE  IDYLL  OF  THE  BRACKEN Pilling 67 

WAITING  FOR  THE  WINDS Parmenter.  .  .  69 

THE   DUNE  GLORY Swarthout 71 

A  ROAD  TO  THE  DUNES Quayle 73 

THE  CLOUDS  AT  ANCHOR Hansen 74 

A  SEA  NOOK Hansen 76 

DUNE  DISTANCES Parmenter .  .  .  79 

DUNE  GRASSES Parmenter.  .  .  81 

A  DUNE  CREST Parmenter ...  82 

THE  DUNE  SWAMP Parmenter ...  83 

A  RIVER  MEADOW Parmenter ...  85 

NESTING  TIME Parmenter.  .  .  87 

A  SUMMER  GLORY Cable 89 

GOD'S  POETRY Parmenter ...  91 

LOOKING  FOR  THE  LILIES Hansen 93 

THE  LILY  POND Quayle 95 

TAKE  No  THOUGHT  FOR  THE  MORROW.  Cable 97 

THE  MURMUROUS  PINES Miss  Smith.  .  99 

LISTENING Parmenter .  .  .  101 

LONELY Parmenter ...  102 

A  SOLITARY Parmenter.  .  .  103 

LOVERS Parmenter.  .  .  104 

WHERE  TRILLIUMS  BLOOM Pilling 105 

FAREWELL  TO  CARE 107 

THE  HOUSE  OF  DREAMS Parmenter .  .  .  109 

DAWDLING  ON  THE  RIVER Parmenter.  .  .  Ill 

THE  BEND  IN  THE  RIVER Parmenter ...  112 

VIOLETS Pilling 113 

NOSING  AROUND Quayle 115 

BUD-TIME Parmenter.  .  .  117 

8 


INDEX  TO  PICTURES  AND  ARTISTS 

PAGE 

THE  THREE  GRACES Parmenter ...  119 

A  SHADOW Parmenter ...  120 

TOWARD  THE  LAND  OF  REST Hansen 123 

THE  CHIMES Powell 125 

ISLANDED  IN  BEAUTY Hansen 127 

THE  VEILED  SKIES Hansen 128 

THE  SOLACE  OF  THE  WATERS Hansen 131 

ONE  OF  GOD'S  WILD  FLOWERS Cable 133 

SAILING  TO  THE  RIVER Quayle 135 

A  LISTENING  SHADOW Parmenter.  .  .  137 

SOME  SUMMER  LAUGHTER Parmenter .  .  .  139 

THE  DAY  STAR Pilling 140 

IN  GOD'S  GARDEN Parmenter .  .  .  143 

AN  ETCHING  OF  NATURE Parmenter ...  145 

LISTENING  TO  THE  WATERS Parmenter.  .  .  146 

THE  SUNSHINE  ROAD Pilling 149 

ANOTHER  RIVER Heeley 151 

A  SILHOUETTE  OF  SUMMER Parmenter.  .  .  152 

LINGERING  ON  A  SUNSET  WATER Hansen 154 

A  ROAD  SET  TO  Music Maywood. . . .  155 

A  PEACE  TOKEN Parmenter .  .  .  157 

GETTING  HOME Lewis 159 

A  MAKER  OF  THE  DUSK Parmenter ...  161 

TIRED  OUT Parmenter .  .  .  163 

WHAT  THE  SKY  LEANS  ON Cable 165 

A  PLACE  OF  DREAMS Parmenter ...  167 

A  ROADWAY  OF  WINTER Cable 169 

READY  TO  GAD  ABOUT Quayle 171 

ALL  THE  YEAR  ROUND Parmenter ...  172 

THE  PIONEER Parmenter .  .  .  173 

WIND-SWEPT Cable 175 

A  MORNING  SKY Hansen 177 

TRACERY Parmenter.  .  .  179 

ENTHRONED Parmenter ...  181 


INDEX  TO  PICTURES  AND  ARTISTS 

PAGE 

THE  PRAIRIE Parmenter .  .  .  183 

THE  GAYLE Quayle 185 

NATURE'S  BOOKMARK Parmenter ...  186 

REMOTE  FROM  STORM Parmenter .  ,  .  189 

LAKE  BEAUTIFUL  AT  NOON Powell 191 

SHADOW  GRASSES Quayle 192 

ALL  READY Quayle 197 

WAITING  FOR  THE  BOY Quayle 198 

SNOW-BOUND Pilling 199 

THE  SNUG Quayle 203 

Do  N'T  HURRY Parmenter .  .  .  205 

THE  PETREL Quayle 207 

ANCHORED Quayle 209 

A  HOME  RUN Quayle 211 

FRIENDS  FOREVER Parmenter .  .  .  213 

THE  HEADLAND Maywood. ...  215 

A  WRACK  OF  STORM 217 

"THERE  is  SORROW  ON  THE  SEA" Pace 219 

GOD  's  SMILING Pilling 221 

IT  SNOWED  LAST  NIGHT Pilling 223 

LATTICED  WITH  SNOW Cable 225 

THE  SNOW-BOUND  WATER Cable 227 

A  CARNIVAL  OF  SNOW Cable 229 

THE  PINE  FOREST 232 

"O  REST,  YE  BROTHER  MARINERS"  .  .  Cable 235 

FOLDED  WINGS Cable 238 

FAREWELL .  .Hansen. . .  240 


The   Joy   Forever 


ON  the  east  shore  of  one  of  Amer-  The  Joy 
ica's  inland  seas  (which  one  is  not  Forever 
material)  I  have  spent  sundry 
summers,  and  if  I  set  a-talking  and 
grow  garrulous,  set  it  down  not  to 
age,  but  to  love;  for  love  and  age  are 
alike  garrulous.  Good  things  bear  talk- 
ing of,  and  that  right  often.  Did 
not  Leonardo  so  frequently  paint  a 
smile  upon  the  lips  of  those  he  loved  to 
celebrate,  as  that  this  shadow  of  laughter 
has  passed  into  the  sayings  of  the  world 
as  the  "smile  of  Leonardo?"  Life's 
mercies  will  bear  frequent  celebration. 
There  should  be  celebrated  natal  days 
for  the  visions  and  loveliness  and  heav- 
enly visitations  of  our  hearts.  Pack  the 
11 


Beside  Lake  calendar  full  of  birthdays  of  holy  things, 
Beautiful  ancj  so  make,  by  and  by,  each  day  an 
anniversary.  I  remember,  with  laughter, 
the  rainy  night  on  which,  long  ago,  I 
began  to  read  "The  Fairie  Queene,"  and 
a  windy  day  when,  blown  by  the  untir- 
ing wind,  I  found  upon  the  prairies  Corn- 
well's  poem,  "The  Whippoorwill;"  and 
the  afternoon  when  for  the  first  time  I 
lifted  mine  eyes  unto  the  hills  and  saw 
the  mountains  build  battlements  of  snow 
toward  the  sun;  and  the  bewildering  day 
when  I  first  saw  the  pine  trees  in  the 
Sierras  and  heard  their  haunting  psalm- 
ody. Why,  certes,  these  are  birthdays 
to  me,  and  shall  be  evermore;  and  if  I 
were  to  take  a  calendar  (as  would  be 
wiser  than  most  I  do)  and  inscribe  thereon 
some  glad  event  of  soul,  some  revela- 
tional  mood,  some  sacrament  in  religion 
or  love  or  service  or  discovery  of  book 
or  herohood  where  least  I  thought  to 
find  one,  or  poem  that  tuned  the  heart 
to  new,  sad  music,  or  landscape  beautiful 
with  light  or  dusk  or  moonlight  or  caress 
of  water  and  the  vista  of  backward  mov- 
12 


ing  seas — if  I  were  to  write 
over  against  each  date  some 
gladness  it  had  brought  into 
my  life,  each  day  in  the  year- 
long reckoning  would  be 
starred  with  some  radiant 
memory.  Such  calendar  is 
well  worth  anybody's  making, 
inasmuch  as  it  would  give  new 
data  for  thankfulness.  How- 
ever, let  this  pass.  I  speak 
now  of  the  lake  with  tilt  of 
wave  and  music  of  it,  of  shore 
and  dune  and  pine  and  mysti- 
fying lights  upon  the  sunset 
waters  and  the  windings  of  the 
river  to  meet  the  waiting  am- 
plitude of  horizonless  waves. 
God's  perpetuated  mercy  is 
that  beauty  is  customary;  but 
in  some  places  beauties  do  as 
stars  do  in  certain  spaces  of 
the  skies — they  cluster.  Be- 
side Lake  Beautiful  is  such  a 
spot. 

I  have  dwelt,  in  my  time, 
13 


The  Beech  Woods 


Beside  Lake  beside  many  waters.  As  I  am  beside  each, 
Beautiful  I  seem  to  love  that  most.  No  spot  holds 
all.  As  when  you  hold  one  child  upon  your 
knee,  that  child  is  sweetest  to  you  of  your 
little  brood;  and  when  you  hold  another, 
that  one  seems  dearest,  too.  So  with  the 
landscapes  I  have  seen.  Rivers  are  fair, 
so  fair  when  you  are  beside  them;  and 
little  lakes  that  blur  a  little  area  with 
their  beauty;  and  hills  of  slight  altitude 
with  their  fair  sides  undulating  and  with 
greens  melting  tint  into  tint  and  swaying 
from  afar  with  sedate  and  stately  motion ; 
or  prairie  lands  billowing  skyward  with 
the  wind — as  for  that,  all  are  fair.  That 
is  my  heart's  last  word.  I  love  them  all. 
My  pages  of  memory  are  sown  to  pic- 
tures which  I  humbly  hope  and  pray 
my  God  will  let  me  have  when  I  have 
come  to  stay  with  Him  in  heaven:  and 
I  think  He  will.  I  must  not  forget  this 
old  home  where  all  my  schooldays  have 
been  passed  and  where  I  have  met  loves 
and  mercies  and  sufferings  and  sore 
battles  and  hard-fought  fights  which 
14 


Beside  Lake  lifted  up  the  shout  of  victory  when  the 

Beautiful  fight  was  done.     He  who  remembers  is 

stocking  up  his  life  for  eternal  years,  and 

can  track  his  journey  across  the  spaces 

by  the  album  memory  keeps. 


"Sunset  and  Evening  Star" 


A   Great  Water 

BUT   if   you  are  going  to  the  waters  A  Great 
for  some  sweaty  summer  days,  this  Water 
advice  I  give  you:    Go  to  a  great 
water,    where  the  waters  can  lose  them- 
selves against  the  sky.      The  shoreless- 
ness  will  help  you  from  yourself;  and,  be- 
sides, the  trumpets  of  the  great  waters  are 
louder  than  the  trivial  bugles  of  a  lesser 
flood.      They  who  live  inland  far  from 


Wistful 
19 


Beside  Lake  the  billow's  accustomed  beat,  when  they 
Beautiful  go  keside  the  waves,  need  to  get  in  hearing 
of  great  waters  whose  warring  voices  shall 
deluge  the  long,  dim  coming  year  with  fit- 
ful tumult  of  tremendous  minstrelsy.  Not 
that  the  lesser  lakes  have  not  their  per- 
sonalities of  grace  which  can  nowhere  be 
found  but  there!  Each  stream  or  lake 
has  its  own  possession  of  beauty,  like 
each  woman's  face.  Who  would  have  it 
otherwise?  Not  I,  in  any  case. 

But  I  am  beside  a  great  lake,  fronting 
its  grass-green  waves  that  swim  out  to 
the  sky;  and  behind,  rises  a  sand-dune, 
lifting  to  the  elevation  of  a  foothill  and 
crowded  with  oak  and  beech  and  birch 
and  cedars  and  pines,  and  aromatic  with 
their  mingled  balsams;  and  beyond  the 
hill  a  little  lake  in  the  confines  of  its 
pine-rimmed  shores,  catches  the  sky,  with 
sunburnt  noons  and  clouded  mornings 
and  gorgeous  sunsettings;  and  miles 
away,  through  a  woodland  of  stately 
Norway  pines,  is  another  lake,  in  which 
the  lesser  lake  might  be  drowned  a 
hundred  times  with  scant  compassion; 
20 


and  far  out  on  its  sky-line  there  lift  the  A  Great 
unspeakable   lonelinesses   of   sand-dunes,  Water 
flowerless  as  a  waste  of  tossing  waters 
and  grassless  as  the  unappeasable  Sahara. 
Sand-cliff  and  pines  and  dunes  of  grass- 
grown    or    grassless    yellow    sands,    and 
shining  river  drowsing  to  the  wide  open 
of  the  great  lake,  and  baby  lake,  and  lake 
in  its  teens,   and  then  the  grown  lake,' 
unhorizoned  like  the  sea — these  are  our 
belongings  who  spend  a  summer  beside 
Lake  Beautiful. 


Waiting 


In  Port 


A  Summer  Sea 


OUR  cabin  is  not  near  the  lake,  but  A  Summer 
on  the  lake.  This  is  a  difference  Sea 
not  in  words,  but  in  meanings.  To 
be  on  the  lake  is  the  pleasure  paramount. 
So  we  are.  Our  front  dooryard  is  the  great 
expanse  of  waters.  We  have  not  fenced 
this  dooryard,  thinking  it  a  trifle  unman- 
nerly and  unneighborly  to  do  so  civilized 
a  thing;  and,  besides,  it  would  be  ex- 
pensive, and  poor  folks  must  be  eco- 
nomical. And  our  front  yard  is  so  big 


Beside  Lake  that  it  would  be  like  fencing  in  a  field  of 
Beautiful  the  blue  sky.  And  in  the  winter  when 
the  waters  put  their  rude  shoulders,  ar- 
mored in  ice,  against  obstacles,  puny 
hindrances  crush  up  like  flowers  held  in 
the  hands  of  frantic  wrath.  We  are  here 
unfenced  like  the  great  plains  when  Coro- 
nado  saw  them  first  and  wondered  at 
them.  The  wide  waters !  What  a  benefi- 
cence they  are!  How  they  shame  our 
weariness  to  rest  and  our  littleness  to 
largeness!  How  their  music  sets  the 
soul  a-sobbing!  How  their  night  voices 
reach  you,  though  you  are  a  far  wanderer 
in  the  misty  land  of  dreams,  and  call  to 
you  as  with  voices  of  your  half-forgotten 
yesterdays  and  bid  you  stumble  back- 
ward through  the  black  lanes  of  sleep  to 
find  the  sunlight  flashing  on  your  pillow 
and  flecking  your  face!  The  wide  waters! 
Summer  and  the  water — and  then  your 
fins  begin  to  sprout!  I  think  that  the 
original  state  of  us  all,  when  we  had  well 
gotten  on  in  our  evolution,  was  fishes. 
We  breathed  through  gills:  We  scooted 
through  the  weeds  on  lake  shore:  We 
28 


neither  needed  nor  wanted  feet — fins  suf-  A  Summer 
ficed  us:  We  ate  our  food  uncooked:  ^ea 
We  were  brothers  of  the  snapping  turtle: 
We  were  easily  fooled,  biting  at  what 
was  no  meat  for  fishes:  And  now  that 
we  are  evolved  to  men  and  women,  we 
feel  our  origin  on  us  and  hie  to  the  waters 
and  practice,  as  it  were,  on  ourselves  im- 
paling our  fishy  kin  on  hooks,  decoying 
them  into  the  frying  pan;  and  so  are  a 
race  of  cannibals  eating  our  own  kind. 
What  barbarians  we  be!  But  who  can 
be  near  the  water  without  feeling  his 
skin  itch  where  the  fins  are  incubating? 
Who  can  see  the  fluffy  waters  lift  and  fall 
without  wanting  to  wade  or  souse  or 
swim?  There  comes  to  be  a  swimmy 
motion  in  the  walk  such  as  sailors  wear. 
Near  water,  we  become  part  of  the  finny 
tribe.  For  my  part,  I  can  not  keep  out 
of  the  water  when  it  is  near.  Not  that  I 
love  cleanliness,  though,  after  the  manner 
of  Jack  Falstaff,  my  attempt  is  to  live 
cleanly,  as  a  nobleman  should;  but  this 
gravitation  to  the  lake  and  stream  is  not 
a  passion  for  cleansing,  but  a  passion  for 

29 

The  Music 

of  the  Waters 


Beside  Lake    aboriginal   fishiness. 


Gypsying 

When   I   dive  and      With  the 


Beautiful  swim  under  the  water,  and  my  breath 
comes  short  and,  like  a  turtle,  I  must 
come  to  the  surface  to  breathe,  I  feel  the 
defect  of  my  evolution.  I  am  moving 
backward.  Aforetime,  I  dimly  recall,  I 
could  sport  with  the  porpoises  and  swim 
with  the  sharks  and  drink  fresh  water 
with  the  trout.  And  if  I  were  in  water 
long  enough  I  could  do  the  like  again  (I 
feel  it  in  my  fins).  I  have  backslidden, 
that  is  clear.  Environment  is  shingling 
off  fins  and  scales  until  here  I  am  only  a 
land  lubber  who  was  meant  for  a  catfish 
or  a  buffalo-fish.  How  are  the  mighty 
fallen !  Walking  eleven  months  a  year  on 
asphalt  pavements  is  not  conducive  to 
30 


Wind 


that  jaunty  and  ecstatic  motion  which  A  Summer 
the  fishes  know.  My  vertebrae  are  jolty,  ^ea 
my  fins  are  either  eroded  or,  on  my  lower 
extremities  (the  reference  is  to  my  legs), 
are  clubbed  into  feet.  Small  wonder  I 
cut  so  sorry  a  figure  in  the  water  that  the 
minnows  even  laugh  out  loud  at  my 
ungainliness.  Atrophy,  through  disuse, 
is  what  the  surgeons  call  my  fishy  malady. 
I  fear  it  will  not  be  mended  till  I  am 
given  a  parish  on  the  sea.  Till  then  there 
really,  in  my  conviction,  is  not  any  rea- 
sonable hope  that  I  shall  sprout  fins  or 
lose  feet.  Land  lubbers  can  not  grow 
such  luxuries.  But  here,  where  the  water 
winks  at  you  through  your  window  and 
makes  a  dash  for  you  as  soon  as  you 
walk  through  your  door,  I  can  not  deny 
that  where  my  fins  were  in  the  remem- 
bered state  I  feel  the  itch  of  growth  and 
feel  an  almost  irresistible  tendency  be- 
times to  lie  flat  on  the  sandy  road  and 
try  propelling  myself  by  my  invisible 
flippers.  Should  I  be  so  overcome  by 
my  ancestral  proclivities,  some  of  the 
frivolous  among  the  inhabitants  will 
31 


Beside  Lake  sagely  relate  one  to  another,  with  a 
Beautiful  solemn  wagging  of  the  pow,  "Yes,  yes, 
what  a  pity!  He  is  insane:  but  I  have 
been  expecting  it."  Conventionalities 
forbid  a  return  to  ancestral  type,  more  's 
the  pity. 


The  Solitary  Voyager 


Staying  on  the  Top  of  the 
Water 

A  a  rule  I  stay  on  the  top  of  the  Staying  on 
water,  out  of  deference  to  my  the  Top  of 
neighbors.  Neighbors  are  exacting.  the  Water 
These  summer  neighbors  are.  I  like  it  not, 
but  must  endure  it.  These  people  object 
to  a  man  getting  drowned  in  his  own  boat. 
I  think  that  is  exasperating.  Why  should 
a  man  own  a  boat  if  he  may  not  be 
drowned  in  it?  And,  besides,  does  not 
the  Declaration  guarantee  a  man  the 
right  to  liberty  and  the  pursuit  of  happi- 
ness? This  disinclination  to  let  a  man 
drown  is  a  clear  infringement  on  the 
rights  of  man.  Once,  in  the  face  of 
public  opinion,  I  tried  this  feat.  The 
day  was  brave  and  the  waters  were 
ferocious.  They  were  tempting  above 
what  is  written.  They  shouted  out  at 
33 


Beside  Lake  me,  "You  dasn't,  you  dasn't,  you ;" 

Beautiful  and  could  a  man,  grown,  take  a  dare? 
No,  not  and  retain  the  spirit  of  a  man; 
and  so,  with  persistent  endeavor,  which 
suffered  many  things  from  many  waves 
which  swamped  my  boat  and  me  repeat- 
edly, I  at  last,  by  portage,  came  into  the 
river;  and  then  with  viking  speed  ran 
the  gauntlet  of  the  angry  waters,  much 
to  my  comfort,  and  by  good  sailorship 
running  in  the  long  troughs  of  the  long 
waves,  came  out  on  the  high  seas.  Where- 
upon it  was  my  turn  to  shout,  "Who 
dasn't?  Aye,  aye,  Yeh!"  The  waves 
frothed  and  talked  back  with  wild  vocif- 
erations and  gesticulations.  They  spoke 
words  not  in  the  dictionary.  Talked  of 
snobs  and  intruders,  of  "  tender- foot " 


The  Wistful  Sunset 


and  impertinence:  but  those 
trivialities  touched  me  not. 
Was  I  not  on  the  wagging  crests 
of  mad  billows,  and  did  not  my 
boat  sway  with  riot  a  transport 
of  triumph,  and  did  not  the 
waves  writhe  and  fling  long  arms 
of  furious  effort  to  engulf  the 
boat  and  its  fishy  occupants,  and 
did  not  the  wind  blow  its  wild- 
est, and  did  it  not  scorn  to  be 
quiet  or  leave  the  waters  a  mo- 
ment's peace?  But  those  family 
difficulties  were  not  my  matter. 
I  kept  on  my  way  and  could  not 
be  mixed  with  the  domestic  fuss 
of  wave  and  wind.  I  was  swim- 
ming; and  my  fins  were  adum- 
brating. Arrah,  there!  And  I 
was  rowing  against  the  wind, 
which  was  truly  vicious;  and 
what,  with  home  troubles  and 
my  impertinence  of  trespassing 
on  its  imminent  domain,  the 
lake  was  really  "nasty,"  and 
plunged  its  huge  shoulder 

35 

Two  Lovers 
of  the  Rioer 


Staying  on 
the  Top  of 
the  Water 


Beside  Lake  against  my  boat's  prow  and  would  not 
Beautiful  jet  me  get  an  oar's  length  to  the  forward : 
but  I,  being  from  the  West,  and  some- 
thing of  a  schemer  myself,  and  having 
grown  from  ladhood  with  prairie  winds, 
knew  a  thing,  and  when  the  waters  rose 
highest,  urged  thereto  by  the  wind,  I 
would  scud  along  the  quiet  valley  of  the 
wave- trough,  and  laughed  the  outrageous 
wind  to  scorn  when  I  met  him  on  the 
wave  crest  again.  Aye,  but  I  thought 
the  day  a  Marathon!  I  fear  I  boasted 
against  both  wind  and  water.  I  blush 
to  think  I  might  be  so  emboldened,  but, 
fear  me,  I  was.  The  flesh  is  weak,  es- 
pecially fishy  flesh ;  and  were  my  fins  not 
fairly  getting  usable?  And  my  laugh  was 
redolent  with  success,  I  grant;  and  a 
spirit  of  Falstaffian  boasting  was  on  me: 
and  on  the  plunging  wave  I  laughed  de- 
risively. The  Bible  has  some  sane  re- 
marks on  the  haughty  spirit  coming  into 
proximity  with  destruction.  I  should 
have  had  those  words  by  heart  ere  I  was 
boisterous  in  boast  with  the  nettled  wave. 
The  Folded  Howbeit,  to  hasten  to  the  wet  end  of  this 
Oars 


watery  adventure,  the  wave  crept  upon  Staying  on 
me  unawares  like  a  cat  and  swamped  my  the  Top  of 
boat— my  boat  and  me— filled  my  craft  the  Water 
so  full  of  water  that  it  ran  over  the  top, 
which  thing  is  not  convenient  for  keep- 
ing on  the  top  of  riotous  waters.  The 
lad  and  I  gracefully  stepped  out  of  the 
boat  into  the  water.  And  the  waves 
giggled  and  then  roared,  and  were  of- 
fensively personal  in  their  hilarity.  They 
would  souse  down  on  us  as  we  swam 
gracefully  (we  did  all  things  gracefully, 
be  it  observed),  and  frothed  and  bickered 
and  swashed  and  fooled  with  the  boat, 
and  washed  the  oars  out  when  I  had  put 
them  in;  for  were  not  the  oars  and  the 
boat  my  property?  And  could  I  not  do 
as  I  would  with  mine  own?  But  small 
sense  of  propriety  had  those  jesting 
waves!  They  would  come  and  decoy 
one  oar  one  way,  and,  when  I  was  swim- 
ming for  that,  another  oar  another  way, 
and  kept  my  blood  circulating  wildly: 
for  I  must  not  drift  to  the  shore  oarless. 
To  be  ducked  in  mad,  wild  water  is  no 
discredit,  but  not  to  have  one's  oars  ready 
37 


Beside  Lake  for  further  propelling  of  the  drenched 
Beautiful  fooat  tne  moment  we  came  to  land  would 
reflect  on  one's  seamanship.  So  I  busied 
myself  keeping  the  oars  in  the  brave 
little  boat  I  loved  so  much,  and  which 
was  discreetly  fond  of  me.  And  the 
nearer  we  drew  to  shore  the  more  the 
waves  were  impertinent.  They  were 
grossly  unmannerly.  They  would  lift  in 
sheer  acclivities  of  cliff  and  frown  over 
us  and  then  bulge  and,  blurring  the  sky 
with  angry  churn  of  snow,  would  crash 
down  and  swallow  us  up,  boat  and  boy 
and  man,  and  set  both  oars  gadding  in 
inconvenient  directions;  and  before  I 
could  gather  the  vagabonds,  another 
wave  would  rage  down  on  us,  not  in  fun 
now,  but  spunky  and,  I  thought,  rather 
inclined  to  be  mean  sometimes;  and  then 
waves  and  waves  and  waves  would  drench 
us  without  a  second's  lull.  But,  withal, 
they  did  what  they  did  not  mean;  and 
we  were  shrewd  enough  to  know  (for 
boat,  boy,  and  man  of  us  were  shrewd, 
though  waves  and  wind  knew  it  not) 
they  would  do,  namely,  drift  us  wildly 
38 


shoreward.     It  beat  rowing  all  to  pieces.  Staying  on 
Rowing  that  morning  had  been  arduous  *he  Top  of 
business.      My   arms    had    grown   vilely 
tired,  though  I  never  let  on  to  the  waves 
or  winds;    but   I   was   sadly   perspiring 
though  sitting  in  my  bathing  suit,  which 
is  my  nearest  approach  to  being  decol- 
lete :   and  when  the  waves  took  to  rowing 


The  Wailing  Oar 


Beside  Lake  for  me,  who  was  I  to  suggest  to  them  that 
Beautiful  they  were  lackwits  to  do  for  nothing 
what  I  had  been  willing  to  pay  good 
wages  for?  But  so  they  shouldered  us 
shoreward  at  a  dead-run  of  speed.  The 
boy  and  boat  and  I  had  our  quiet  laugh 
at  their  expense,  but  did  it  on  the  sly 
lest  they  should  see  us,  which,  unhappily, 
they  did  at  last;  and  as  we  came  into 
the  surf  near  shore,  they  saw  how  we  had 
fooled  them  and  without  a  single  flip  of 
our  fins  had  swam  from  far  out  on  the 
surly  lake  to  the  surf,  where  we  could 
almost  jump  to  land,  and  how  the  boat, 
with  never  the  propulsion  of  an  oar,  was 
almost  at  the  landing,  the  waves,  angry 
at  being  outwitted  so,  took  to  pulling  us 
all  out  in  the  vicious  undertow  and  ham- 
mering relentlessly  wave  on  wave  down 
on  us  till  we  \vere  forced  to  breathe 
through  our  gills.  But  our  spunk  was 
up,  too,  and  we  held  on  our  way,  nettled 
at  the  interruption,  but  not  diverted  by 
it,  and  came  to  shore  a  trifle  damp,  be  it 
conceded,  but  in  hilarious  frame  and 
soaked  not  only  with  water,  but  with  the 
40 


delight  of  battle  with  the  cantankerous  Staying  on 
waters,  and  found  our  kind  neighbors  t^le  Top  °* 
down  to  meet  us  and  bent  on  believing  * 
us  drowned.  We  insisted  we  were  not, 
made  light  of  their  gloomy  forebodings, 
walked  blithely  up  the  drenched  sands 
after  hauling  our  boat  up  to  rest  and 
dry  and  getting  the  oars  together  ready 
for  further  business,  as  the  occasion  of- 
fered, but  found  some  of  our  neighbors 
surly  because  they  had  thought  we  were 
drowned  and  we  thought  we  were  not, 
and  others,  of  a  more  kindly  frame,  per- 
tinaciously insisting  that  we  had  no  right 
to  get  drowned  in  our  own  boat.  And 
the  life-saver  came  in  while  the  under- 
signed was  eating  his  dinner  and  asked, 
"Where  is  that  man  that  was  drowned?" 
and  I  replied  gleefully,  "Here  am  I;" 
and  he  retreated,  crestfallen.  But  what 
shall  we  say  of  the  decay  of  liberty  when 
in  one's  own  conveyance  he  may  not  be 
drowned  without  stirring  up  objections 
among  the  neighbors?  Among  my  sea- 
faring ancestors  no  such  intrusions  on 
personal  rights  were  thought  of.  They 
41 


Beside  Lake    were  all  drowned  and   no  objection  of- 

Beautiful    fered,  so  far  as  we  can  discover  on  diligent 

inquiry.     Marcus  Brutus  should  be  here, 

with  his  meek  friend  Cassius,  to  bemoan 

the  passing  of  liberty. 


Spring  Wonder 


Caught 

Napping 


Our  Piscatorial  Origin 


THAT  man  evolved  from  the  fishes  Our  Pisca-. 
seems  to  me  an  elementary  propo-  torial  Origin 
sition  in  evolution.  Even  the  way- 
faring man  must  see  that.  We  have  be- 
come so  skilled  in  tracing  our  descent,  or 
rather  ascent,  from  our  curious  and  not 
always  palatable  ancestors  that  when  once 
this  piscatorial  origin  is  mentioned,  our 
minds  will  at  once  revert  to  a  multitude 
of  circumstances  clearly  supportive  of  the 
idea.  Our  simian  ancestry  must  sink  or 
swim  with  this  theory.  Our  interior  and 
exterior  confirm  this  hypothesis.  Why  has 
science  been  so  dilatory  in  seeing  that 
when  we  attempt  to  trace  our  ascent 
through  land-lubber  animals  we  are  hope- 
45 


Marooned 


Beside  Lake  lessly  misled;  but  the  moment  we  begin 
Beautiful  to  swim  for  our  ancestry  we  can  catch 
its  fin  and  have  safe  sailing.  Do  we  not 
speak  of  people  being  slippery?  What  is 
this  but  a  survival  of  the  time  when  we 
were  nothing  else?  So  viewed,  being 
slippery  is  not  a  vice,  but  a  primitive, 
though  aqueous,  virtue.  Who  that  has 
handled  fish  recently  impaled,  and  now 
en  route  from  hook  to  boat,  but  may 
testify  that  slipperiness  is  a  method  of 
survival?  We  must  change  front  from  our 
unkind  mood  toward  slippery  folk.  They 
are  really  the  aboriginally  virtuous. 
When  once  we  light  on  the  true  hypothesis 
of  origin,  how  convincingly  clear  does 
everything  become.  Volatility  is  not  a 
vice;  far  away  from  it.  It  is  an  an- 
cestral virtue.  We  must  slip  to  live. 
Back-sliding,  in  this  true  view,  becomes 
a  virtue.  Woe  to  those  theologians  who 
have  looked  on  it  as  a  sin !  They  are  not 
modern.  When  once  the  true  evolu- 
tionary and  advanced  thought  is  grasped, 
all  those  puerilities  of  blame  vanish.  The 
vain  man,  stuffed  with  promises  and 
46 


slender  in  executions,  has  been  blamed,  Our  Pisca- 
nay,  vilified.  I  grieve  to  think  of  the  torial  Origin 
opprobrious  epithets  so  good  a  man  as 
myself  has  heaped  on  such  as  have  prom- 
ised to  return  the  money  they  borrowed 
of  me  and  have  even  set  the  day  when  I, 
poor  expectant,  have  waited  for  their 
appearance  as  the  sick  for  the  coming  of 
the  day,  but  not  with  as  safe  and  sure 
results.  For  after  the  longest  night,  day 
gets  here,  sometimes  sorely  bedraggled 
and  outrageously  late,  but  comes  with 
absolute  certainty.  Not  so  my  debtor. 
I  wait:  he  tarries.  He  is  tarrying  yet. 
And  in  my  blindness,  not  knowing  ori- 
gins, I  thought  him  criminal,  when  lo! 
having  seen  that  he  once  was  a  fish,  this 
47 


The  Singing 

Boughs 


Beside  Lake  slippery  trick  is  solid  virtue.  It  is  the 
Beautiful  virtue  of  the  fathers.  And  what  are 
liars  but  persons  slippery  in  statement, 
men  (or  women)  to  whom  former  utter- 
ances have  no  binding  character,  persons 
whose  feet  slip  from  one  statement  to 
another,  as  one  who  walks  on  the  sea- 
weed rocks  of  the  ocean?  The  original 
safety  of  the  fishy  ancestor  was  just  here. 
You  could  not  locate  him.  He  was  versa- 
tile, and,  so,  unhampered.  Praises  be  to 
the  liar.  He  has  been  misprized  long 
enough.  The  doctrine  of  evolution  firmly 
grasped,  the  liar  becomes  the  sure  reliance 
of  society.  He  is  not  to  be  condemned, 
but  commended.  Let  those  who  slur 
Falstaff  be  humble  in  apologies.  That 
good  knight  was  the  very  fat  of  virtue. 
He  was  virtue  grown  obese.  Then,  how 
are  we  to  account  for  the  gullibility  of 
mankind  save  on  this  fishy  hypothesis? 
Foolish  science  has  tripped  and  fallen. 
Here  is  the  truth  after  which  your  Bacons 
and  Spencers  have  clutched.  Would 
they  could  have  seen  this  revolutionary 
hypothesis  and  have  rejoiced!  Fish  bite 
48 


without  looking.  Spoons,  hooks,  even  Our  Pisca- 
strings  with  no  semblance  of  any  real  torial  Origin 
attractiveness  in  edibles — they  bite  at  all. 
So  mortals  are.  You  can  fool  them  with 
any  spoon.  You  do  not  need  a  hook. 
You  need  nothing  to  make  mention  of. 
Simply  suggest  a  thought  and  they  will 
bite.  I  have  no  mood  to  boast,  but  in 
self-respect  feel  that  I  have  hit  on  the 
explanatory  clause  of  the  entire  set  of 
human  particulars.  Fish  we  were  and 
fishy  we  are,  and  the  mystery  of  life  is 
at  last,  and  by  me,  reduced  to  simplicity. 
So  much  for  dwelling  in  the  neighbor- 
hood of  the  waters. 


Sea-born 


"Whispering 
Hope" 


I 


*r«a 


Our  River 

AND  close  by  where  we  cabin  is  a  Our  River 
river  emptying  into  Lake  Beautiful. 
Wherever  this  word  river  is  pro- 
nounced, a  doorway  of  indefinite  poetry 
has  been  opened  to  all  such  as  love  our 
world  for  its  own  sake.  Such  as  are  Grad- 
grinds  will  inquire:  "Is  it  navigable?" 
"Are  the  bottoms  wide,  or  are  the  banks 
high  and  climb  straight  up  from  the  river 
and  so  exclude  farming?"  "Is  the  soil 
favorable' for  the  growth  of  corn  or,  better, 
for  potatoes?  "  A  series  of  such  questions 
will  the  businessy  person  ask.  But  such 
simple  questions  are  not  for  those  who 
love  the  outdoors.  To  them  a  river 
means  beauty  just  as  sunsets  do.  Farm- 
ing will  look  after  itself  because  it  is  The  Loitering 
53  Stream 


U-i 


Beside  Lake  lucrative:  but  plain  beauty  can  not  be 
Beautiful  gold  and  has  no  market  value.  But  a 
river  may  run  anywhere  in  wild  water- 
falls, roving  through  thickets  dusky  at 
noons,  feeling  for  ledges  with  gusto  as 
boys  to  turn  somersaults,  or  babbling 
among  pebbles  or  getting  lost  in  marshes 
or  taking  wild  detours  around  thousands 
of  acres  of  farmed  fields  or  bearing  traffic, 
effortless,  on  its  wide  breast  or  hugging 
dark  bases  of  bleak  rocks  where  not  one 
lone  flower  can  find  hospitality  of  rootage 
or  bloom — whether  the  stream  be  little 
or  big,  whether  called  creek  or  river, 
whether  covered  with  laborious  barge, 
commerce-laden,  or  beautified  with  row 
boat  and  canoe,  what  matters?  The 
stream  is  fair  as  a  human  face  and  loved 
of  those  who  love  the  beautiful.  On  a 
day  sweet  with  sunlight  and  abundant 
in  meadow-breath  and  tender  passing  of 
the  wind,  I  set  out  in  an  indian  canoe  up 
the  windings  of  our  streams.  My  ship 
was  poetry;  for  who  has  seen  an  indian 
canoe  knows  it  is  the  one  thing  that  race 
has  handed  to  posterity  as  a  memento 
54 


of  its  sojourn  in  this  blessed  land.  I 
love  to  sit  and  watch  its  shadow  in  the 
water:  for  a  swan-shadow  is  no  more 
graceful.  The  exquisite  prow,  the  bulge 
of  side,  the  swift  narrowing  toward  the 
prow  again;  for  in  the  canoe  there  is  no 
stern,  as  to  a  boat.  Both  ends  are  two 
prows  that  stand  ready  to  cut  the  river 
into  waves  that  run  indian-footed  shore- 
ward with  much  delight. 


Our  River 


Up  Stream 


Beside  Lake  A  touch  and  this  boat  shivers  either 
Beautiful  way.  It  is  a  boat  contrived  for  indolence, 
and  by  it.  You  need  never  to  reverse 
it  nor  make  superfluous  motion.  On  the 
quiet  water,  tilting  to  a  breath  or  touch 
of  hand,  uncertain  as  he  who  was  its 
architect,  the  canoe  is  ready  for  the 
voyage.  And  because  it  is  so  light,  so 
easy  of  portage,  so  skilled  to  sleuth  the 
windings  of  the  shore  and  vagaries  of  the 
current,  and  because  it  was  a  craft  in- 
digenous to  these  waters  before  Pere 
Marquette  walked  along  these  dunes 
with  wondering  eyes  of  discovery,  and 
because  it  is  fairy-fleet  and  answers  with 
such  swift  grace  to  a  touch  of  paddle  on 
the  stream — for  such  reasons  I  take  the 
canoe.  I  cross  the  little  lake  which  holds 
the  river  for  a  moment  before  it  swims 
into  the  lost  wastes  of  the  great  lake, 
slow  along  shores  grown  to  sagging  rank 
grasses,  where  haymakers  swing  sickle 
amongst  these  lush  grasses,  whose  roots 
are  in  the  river  and  whose  meadows  give 
to  the  foot  of  the  mower  as  he  swings  his 
sweaty  scythe  along,  and  the  sweet  scent 
56 


The  Reeds 


of  hay,  new-mown  hay,  comes  to  me  re-  Our  River 

juvinant  of  memories  of  many  years;  and 

I  ply  my  solitary  oar  in  leisure  fashion, 

being  in  no  hurry :  for  the  day  is  long,  the 

sun  is  sweet,  the  rushes  grow  beside  the 

stream,  the  blue  flowers  fluff  to  the  wind, 

the  weeds  tangle  around  the  canoe  keel, 

the  ripple  behind  the  canoe  is  like  the 

smile  of  the  river,  gladdening  to  the  eyes, 

no  haste,  only  happy  leisure,  and  the  river 

shining  toward  the  hills.     A  day  and  a 

river  and  a  canoe!     And  the  stream  in 

this  widened  part  has  no  current  to  feel 

or  see.     It  drowses  like  a  laggard  sail. 

The  surface  is  glass  to  throw  back  shadow 


59 


The  Rushes 


If 


Beside  Lake  of  leaning  flag  and  silent  boat  and  tree 
Beautiful  growing  close  against  the  river  brim. 
Turtles  are  shining  in  the  sun  on  logs 
everywhere.  They  get  the  summer 
through  their  spinal  columns.  When  the 
canoe  draws  near  they  souse  off  into  the 
stream  making  many  ripples.  Swallows 
undulate  from  far  up  in  the  blue  sky  to 
so  close  against  the  river's  brim  as  at 
distant  times  to  cut  the  water  into  a 
ripple  with  tilted  wing,  and  the  stream 
bends  amongst  water  lilies,  whose  pads 
glisten  as  made  of  metal  instead  of  veg- 
etable fiber.  What  is  there  among  grow- 
ing things  so  full  of  sense  of  quiet  as  a 
lily  pad  recumbent  on  the  water  with 
indolent  ease,  or  sometime  fluffed  up 
and  half  folded  where  some  wind  has 
turned  down  a  page  in  this  nature  book, 
and  the  lilies  float  white  boats  at  ease  on 
sleepy  stream?  When  did  our  God  con- 
ceive a  thing  more  fair,  or  how  could  He? 
And  the  canoe  trails  through  these  close- 
grown  lily  pads  and  turns  the  lily  flowers 

Singing  aside  to  make  passage  for  me  who  am 

Toward  going  "upward  with  the  flood."  And 
the  Lake  60 


m 


when  the  water  narrows  to  the  river's  Our  River 
proper  bed,  then  the  current  becomes 
visible  and  is  always  delicious.  The  sight 
of  water  bent  on  coming  to  the  sea  from 
wrhich  it  lifted  long  ago  on  the  wings  of 
the  sun  is  sunny  to  the  heart,  and  here 
the  river  grows  neighborly  of  bank  and 
the  water  flows  deep  and  noiselessly,  mak- 
ing no  whispers,  but  full  of  light  and 
speed,  and  hasting  whither  it  knows,  and 
keeping  its  current  at  the  stream-center, 
so  that  the  canoe  must  thrust  hard  to 
keep  on  its  appointed  way.  Slight  as 
canoe  resistance  is,  resist  it  does  when  the 
current  runs,  noiseless  and  swift.  Onward 
we  go.  The  canoe  is  full  of  delight  as  we 
are,  the  stream  and  I.  We  say  nothing, 
but  sit  smiling,  all  of  us,  like  happy 
hearts.  The  whole  sky  is  bathed  in  glo- 
rious light.  The  clouds  are  vanished.  The 
sun  has  his  way  with  the  world  this  day, 
and  the  world  is  rapturous.  My  canoe 
slips  on  at  the  paddle-stroke.  I  am  in  no 
haste ;  but  it  is  good  to  feel  the  forward  of 
the  craft  at  my  touch,  and  the  river  is  out- 
ward and  we  are  upward,  so  we  must,  this 
61 


Beside  Lake  boat  and  I,  in  common  self-respect,  hold 
Beautiful  On  our  way,  while  the  hills  approach  where 
the  surly  beeches  grow  and  the  whispering 
birches,  and  on  the  ridge,  pines  silhouette 
against  the  vivid  blue  sky,  and  the  banks 
narrow  and  the  current  shallows  and  runs 
fast  and  the  river  makes  sudden  turns,  so 
that  sometimes  I  can  reach  my  paddle 
across  the  green  ribband  of  lush  grasses  and 
touch  the  stream  I  have  just  sailed  over 
from  the  stream  I  am  sailing  on;  and  the 
joy  is  great  to  the  point  of  song.  The 
grasses  droop  heavily  into  the  water,  and 
the  waters  run  deep  under  the  matted, 
leaning  grasses,  making  pools  of  shadow 
and  enticing  quiet,  and  the  shallowing 
stream  makes  its  current  run  zigzag  from 
shore  to  shore  of  the  channel,  and  grows 
so  shallow  that  the  canoe  must  do  the 
like  lest  it  ground ;  and  we  watch  the  cur- 
rent and  turn  with  a  jiffy  motion  to  catch 
where  the  channel  is  deepest  so  we  may 
not  ground,  which  sometimes  we  do,  and 
must  pry  with  the  paddle  to  unmoor  us 
from  the  sands;  and  on  we  go,  upward  to- 
ward the  sources  of  the  river.  And  coming 
62 


BB 


to  a  bridge  built  low  against  the  water,  I  Our  River 
portage  the  canoe  and  dip  in  afresh  and 
go  laughing  up  the  shining  stream;  and  a 
trout  brook  comes  babbling  in  from  a 
ravine  tangled  with  low-set  trees  and  oc- 
casional pines  and  broken  tree-stems,  and 
on  where  the  meadow  broadens  and  cattle 
feed  and  the  stream  widens  and  shallows 
to  my  undoing,  and  pools  stand  betimes 
hip-deep  to  a  grown  man  and  the  waters  "Like  Sunset 
65  in  a  Land 

of  Reeds' 


\m  ' 


Beside  Lake  have  grown  talkative  and  sing  snatches  of 
Beautiful  ^appy  songs,  and  iron-weeds  of  a  lilac 
hue  gather  in  patches  like  some  lilac  gar- 
den, and  the  wild  bees  are  garrulous,  and 
the  stream  goes  on  and  on.  A  cornfield 
tilts  against  the  hill,  and  the  owner  is 
down  in  his  pasture  cutting  nettles  glow- 
ing with  bloom;  and  he  knows  not  the 
name  of  any  flower  that  strews  the  field; 
and  the  canoe  can  go  no  further,  and  I 
haul  it  to  a  bit  of  grass  for  it  to  rest ;  and 
I  go  up-stream  on  foot,  but  not  alone. 
The  river  goes  with  me,  laughing  that  I 
am  afoot,  and  the  ripples  widen  sometime 
and  narrow  at  other  times,  and  a  log  runs 
across  the  stream,  one  of  nature's  foot- 
bridges, and  I,  essaying  to  cross,  find  its 
other  end  sags,  and  I  souse  into  a  pool 
deeper  than  it  looked ;  but  the  water  snig- 
gered at  me  and  I  at  myself;  and  we  were 
both  glad.  This  is  part  of  the  poetry  of 
the  river.  And  a  bridge  casts  shadow  on 
the  river  it  crosses,  and  a  phcebe  builds 
her  house  on  the  beam  by  the  rocks,  and 
the  stream  goes  upward  and  I  with  it; 
and  the  meadows  recede  and  then  draw 
66 


near,  and  the  river  melts  to  a  rill  and  the  Our  River 

beauty  wastes  not,  though  the  river  does ; 

and  I  wander  along  the  banks  and  sit  on 

green  cushions  of  grass  and  lounge  where 

a  tree  casts  restful  shadow,  and  at  last, 

come   to   think  of  it,   that  home  is   far 

away,  and  the  day  has  long  past  its  noon 

and  the  shadows  are  lengthening,  and  the 

canoe  far   below  must  be  lonesome  and 

think  I  am  lost,  and  down-river  I  begin 

to  lag  and  chase  the  butterflies  and  wade 

the  shallow  stream  and  prod  the  pools  to 

see  the  little  fishes  fly  like  sudden  shuttles 

to  and  fro,  and  the  wide  sky  is  full  of 

wonder  and  the  river  is  lakeward  bound, 

and  the  canoe  and  I  are  with  the  river. 

69  Waiting  for 

the  Winds 


Beside  Lake  And  down  with  the  coming  of  the  night 
Beautiful  j  paddle  till  I  reach  the  winding  river  on 
the  lake,  with  the  bluebells  growing  low 
against  the  water  and  shining  their  tender 
blue  as  of  a  baby's  eyes  into  the  limpid 
river  waters.  And  the  crests  of  dark  pines 
gloom  on  high  and  a  canoe  to  row  me 
into  the  setting  of  the  sun!  How  can  I 
hinder  my  goings  at  such  an  hour  on  such 
a  place  till  I  have  glided  out  of  the  quiet 
river  into  the  sea  of  the  lake,  where  the 
swell  from  afar  makes  my  pulse  leap  with 
a  beat  of  pinion  like  an  eagle's? 

O  river!  flow  across  my  heart's  meadow- 
field  all  my  life's  day,  nor  cease  thy  flow- 
ing at  life's  eventide.  Flow,  flow. 


7U 


The  Sand  Dunes 

AID  sand  dunes!  They  are  deserts  The  Sand 
intruding  on  the  habitable  world.  Dunes 
They  have  not  many  equals  for 
loneliness,  desolation,  bereftness  which 
knows  no  comfort,  and  isolation  which  can 
never  be  overcome.  Dunes  are  loneliness 
made  majestic.  Near  our  cabin,  and  front- 
ing for  miles  along  Lake  Beautiful,  are  the 
stretching  sand  dunes  and  grasses  and 
hummocks  and  pools  of  pines.  You  can 
never  weary  of  them  if  you  learn  to  love 
them.  They  hold  you  with  strange  te- 

73  A  Road  to 

the  Dunes 


Beside  Lake  nacity.  I  dream  of  them  and  long  for 
Beautiful  them  through  the  year  when  absent  from 
them.  They  clutch  the  spirit.  They  are 
resultants  of  the  wave  and  wind,  the  up- 
casts of  the  storm  and  the  steady,  in- 
sistent wind-drift.  At  one  point  along 
our  coast  is  a  sand-cliff  cut  to  a  roadway 
by  the  drift  of  wind  from  lake  to  lake; 
and  to  watch  the  sand-cloud  through  this 
roadway  for  the  winds  is  to  see  the  wind 
a-blowing.  In  the  thing  is  something 
eerie,  as  if  spirit  passed  into  visibility. 


The  Clouds 
at  Anchor 


But  miles  on  miles  in  a  huge  peninsula  The  Sand 
are  the  piled  dunes,  with  their  interven-  Dunes 
ing  valleys.    Sometimes  they  are  as  naked 
as  the  sea,  not  one  wisp  of  grass,  not  an 
adventurous  pine,  not  a  trail  of  grape- 
vine, nothing  only  the  drift  of  sands,  how- 
soever calm  the  day,  spits  in  your  face  in 
spleen. 

Some  are  crested  of  grapevines,  which 
sprawl  in  all  their  wild  tracery  of  beauti- 
ful leaf  and  tendril  or  fruit  green  as  em- 
erald or  black  as  drops  of  rain  at  night, 
but  such  a  wreath  as  conquerors  might 
rejoice  to  wear  about  their  warrior  fore- 
heads. What  taught  these  vines  meant 
for  clambering  the  ramparts  of  tall  trees 
to  be  content  on  these  dune  crests  I  know 
not;  but  they  crown  the  surly  sand  with 
such  a  profusion  of  loveliness  as  that  the 
wandering  winds  are  glad  to  freight  them 
with  the  thrilling  odor  of  grape  blos- 
soms or  dawdle  when  the  clusters  of 
grapes  entice  the  bee  and  butterfly  to 
sip  their  uninebriating  wine.  Sometimes 
between  the  dunes  are  meadows  of  lake 
grasses,  pools  cut  off  from  the  wide  lake 
75 


Beside  Lake  by  the  drift  of  sand,  but  with  water 
Beautiful  enough  to  court  the  growing  swamp 
things  to  come  and  stay.  Sometimes  in 
between  high  dunes  are  groups  of  pines, 
huddled  close  together  like  moose  in  win- 
ter quarters ;  and  to  lie  on  the  dull  sands, 
sung  to  of  these  huddled  pines,  makes 
concert  of  loneliness  not  often  equaled  in 
the  earth.  Sometimes  dune  grasses  grow, 
shining  like  steel  swords,  whipped  with 
the  wind  and  circumscribing  a  circumfer- 
ence with  the  sword-point  as  it  s\vings 
round  on  its  facile  wrist.  To  see  this  at- 
tempt at  putting  some  memorial  of  itself 
upon  the  earth  is  pitiful,  and  but  adds  to 
the  dim  loneliness  of  this  dune  region. 
And  these  shining  grasses  climb  when  they 
move  to  the  dune-top,  venturesome  they 
are  and  full  of  aspiring,  but  sometimes 
the  waves  of  sand  drown  them  utterly, 
as  they  do  pine  trees,  and  leave  only  a 
withered  trunk  of  pine  or  blade  of  grass 
to  whistle  to  the  wind.  Desolation  has 
rude  sway  in  these  peninsulas  of  sand. 
But,  few  things  do  I  love  more.  Melan- 
76 


A  Sea  Nook 


choly  is  poured  into  our  blood.    We  have  The  sand 
a  passion  for  it,  and  shall  have  evermore.  Dunes 

Long  mile  on  mile  of  desolation.  No 
one  can  inhabit  this  shifting  waste  save 
the  pines,  and  they  not  always.  Forests 
of  them  have  been  choked  to  death  by  the 
gripping  fingers  of  the  sand.  No  inhab- 
itant shall,  through  the  long  coming  years, 
do  other  than  pitch  passing  camp  here 
for  a  night.  You  can  not  plow  this  waste, 
it  wedges  down  and  up  in  such  rude 
fashion.  No  house  shall  plant  its  home- 
light  here.  The  wild  winds  shall  be  ma- 
rauders here  forever,  and  the  curlew's  call 
shall  fringe  the  Lake  with  sadness,  and 
the  moan  of  winds  inured  to  tempests 
shall  lift  the  sands  to  mist  like  drifting 
snows  and  pile  new  dunes  and  lift  new 
sand-cliffs  whence  the  winds  may  plunge 
down  into  dune  valleys  and  their  pools 
of  pines.  To  stand  on  summer  days  and 
look  far  off  and  see  rehearsals  of  loneli- 
ness, sad,  uninterrupted,  save  by  the 
washing  of  our  inland  sea,  watch  the  yel- 
low desert  peaks  of  dune  pursuing  dune, 
77 


Beside  Lake  flash  in  the  sun,  and  at  the  last  front  the 
Beautiful  geaj  tm-s  is  epochal  to  a  soul.  And  these 
sand-heaps,  from  their  formation,  can  se- 
crete forests  with  never  a  sigh  of  effort. 
No  travel  is  more  deceptive  than  this  dune 
travel.  You  think  it  is  a  stone's-cast  to 
the  shining  pool  of  the  great  Lake,  and 
will  walk  for  hours  before  you  reach  its 
refreshment  of  waters  answering  to  the 
wind.  Wedge-shaped  enclosures  have 
thick-grown  forests  of  pine  and  cedar  and 
beech,  shut  off  from  the  world,  islanded 
in  this  desert  sand,  making  oases  of  sing- 
ing and  lament  and  grim  determinateness 
to  hold  this  hard-fought  fight  against  the 
wickedness  of  sand  and  wind.  There 
gloom  the  dusks  at  noon.  There  moan 
the  wintry  seas  at  summer's  prime;  there 
comes  the  early  night  unpenetrated  by 
the  light  of  any  star.  There  the  owl 
hoots  and  the  bitterns  cry  and  the  swift 
eagles  nest.  Long  lunges  of  grim  sand, 
tossed  into  billows  which  will  not  tarry 
and  can  not  rest,  and  resent  yet  ever 
carry  desolation  in  their  heart  and  hold 
their  world  back  from  the  encroachment 
78 


of  mankind.    Some  place,  so  long  as  these  Tne  Sand 
dunes  endure,  will  be  unhurt  of  human  Dunes 
presence  and  set  apart  for  lasting  solitude 
and  silence  and  the  unmarred  earth. 

And  to  watch  the  dunes  from  a  boat 
tossing  out  on  the  lonely  water  does  but 
accentuate  their  quality,  so  that  their 
bleak  loneliness  has  scarcely  any  com- 
panion in  all  this  world.  I  do  not  know 
a  scene  so  sundered  from  gladness  as  this 
stretch  of  sand  shifting  to  the  wind  or 
anchored  feebly  by  the  anchors  of  the 
dune-grasses  that  swish  in  an  eerie  music 


Dune  Grasses 


Beside  Lake  to  the  wind  which  never  quite  sleeps  on 
Beautiful  those  long  reaches.  To  see  these  dunes  I 
think  worth  a  passage  across  a  continent. 
I  know  not  any  so  extensive  and  so  be- 
reft of  inhabitants.  They  transport  you 
in  a  moment  into  the  dim  deserts  remote 
from  men.  Not  even  the  sea  gives  a 
more  compelling  sense  of  remoteness.  On 
these  dunes  which  stretch  for  miles  to  the 


A  Dune  Crest 


northward  and  westward  and  then  crum-  The  Sand 
pie  around  to  the  northward  and  east-  Dunes 
ward,  the  first  stretch  a  white- tawn  of 
slowly-lifting  shore-sands  thrust  at  the 
last  into  miniature  peaks  of  vine-grown 
cliff  or  pine-crowned  acclivity,  the  second 
a  bleak  assemblage  of  hills  of  sands  that 
answer  to  the  lake-wind's  faintest  sum- 
mons and  trample  dune  after  dune  like  a 
troop  of  lonely  folks  to  a  funeral.  And 
the  pines  are  here  sentineling  the  cliff- 
edge  of  the  sand-ledge  or  wading  down 
deep  into  the  wedge-shaped  ravines  of  far 
sand-dunes,  or  protruding  at  the  prow  of 
some  hill  leaning  toward  lake  or  river. 
83 


The  Dune 

Swamp 


The  River  Meadow 


A  "'ID    down    on     the    river    about    a  The  River 
hundred    boat    lengths    from    the  Meadow 
river-mouth,  lies  a  river  meadow, 
not   marshland  with  marsh   grasses  and 
birds  and  kersloshings  of  the  steps  and 
sometimes   kersousing    of    the    body,   to 
come  up  dripping  and  laughing,  but  lifted 
just   enough  to  wet   the  bottom  of  the 
naked  foot  in  the  walking,  and  sown  to 
grass  and  blackberry  and  raspberry- vines 
and  dogwood  and  nest-places  for  birds  and 
sweet  and  tangy  with  wild  strawberries. 
To  walk  across  this  strip  of  green  is  as 
if  a  body  were  walking  on  wings.    To  set 
foot  on  this  spongy  heath  is  fun,  so  that 
you  walk  to  rest  yourself  from  walking. 
All  wild  things  grow  there,  even  laughter 
87 


Nesting  Time 


Beside  Lake  and  sun-up.  To  resist  this  meadow  is 
Beautiful  well-nigh  impossible.  I  know  its  every 
hole  where  you  break  through  ground  to 
river,  every  vine-tangle  and  ingle-nook, 
every  rise  and  fall  of  ground,  every  hum- 
mock where  a  sheep  might  nibble  or  a 
killdeer  build  a  nest,  but  none  the  less  I 
am  servant  of  the  place.  I  can  hardly 
row  or  drift  past  it.  It  hath  its  way  with 
my  boat  and  me;  and  I  pull  the  boat  to 
the  river  margin  and  leave  it  lying  like  a 
gentle  hand  upon  the  shore,  while  I  step 
ashore  to  feel  the  delicious  spring  of  the 
sweet  meadow,  the  smell  of  wild  straw- 
berries faintly  impregnating  the  air  and 
turn  to  see  my  boat  waiting  for  me  and 
looking  lonesome;  and  then  to  kneel,  or 
what  is  better,  to  sprawl,  and  gather  wild 
strawberries  and  eat  them !  What  epicure 
could  figure  out  a  menu  like  that?  And 
the  inexplicable  azure  of  sky  and  lake  to 
overarch  you  and  invite  you  and  the  river 
shining  and  drifting  and  the  birds  mak- 
ing merry  in  the  bushes  and  the  swallows 
skimming  the  river  or  laughing  out  right 
joyously  into  the  sky,  and  you  eating 


wild  strawberries  to  the  accompaniment  The  River 
of  birds  and  winds  and  waves  heard  dimly  Meadow 
across  the  meadow,  what  is  this  but  gath- 
ering and   eating  poetry?     No  book  to 
read,  surely  not  that,  this  day  and  this 
place.     That  can  be  done  other  wheres 
than  in  a  river  meadow,  where  we  pick 
wild  strawberries  for  the  fun  of  the  juice 


Beside  Lake  on  the  fingers  and  the  fragrance  in  the 
Beautiful  nostrils,    and   not   intermit   the   task   to 
listen  to  the  bobolink's  song, — well  this  is 
life.    Let  us  live  awhile. 

Meantime  the  boat  has  grown  tired 
waiting  for  you,  and  has  let  go  hand-hold 
on  the  shore  and  has  gone  sauntering 
down  the  river  and  has  idled  out  to  the 
greater  water,  and  you  in  no  haste  to 
pursue  it.  You  can  wade  for  it  or  swim 
for  it  when  it  has  come  whither  it  would. 
You  are  eating  wild  strawberries  to  the 
tune  of  indolent  delight,  while  the  meadow 
springs  beneath  you  like  heather. 


The  Lily  Pond 


ON  the  way  to  the  pine  woods,  sel-  The  Lily 
dom    trodden  but  well  worth   the  Pond 
treading,  is  a  path.      Where  Old 
Baldie  obtrudes  his  drifting  sands  across 
the  way  and  shoves  you  into  the  marsh, 
lies   smiling  brightly   a  white  lily  pond. 
It  is  not  large;    it   is   dainty.       On  one 
side  the   hidden   dunes;  to   the   forward 
the    begloomed    pines    drowsing    to    the 
sound  of  their  own   music;    to  the  east 
tamaracks     knee-deep     in     the     marsh; 
and    like    a    broach    at    the    throat    of 
95 


Beside  Lake  beauty  is  a  pond  of  white  lilies.  They 
Beautiful  grow  out  of  reach  of  all  save  that  tribe 
of  men  and  birds  known  as  the  waders, 
and  so  are  the  better  preserved  against 
the  hasty-fingered  who  have  not  learned 
that  some  felicitous  things  are  best  let 
alone  where  God  put  them.  Not  all 
things  should  be  picked  and  stuck  in 
bouquets.  That  is  a  human  fallacy.  Be- 
cause the  poet  picked  the  last  rose  of 
summer  is  not  a  reason  why  he  should 
do  the  like  with  the  first  rose  of  summer. 
Pines  and  tamaracks  and  certain  trees 
which  answer  quickly  to  the  wind  are  on 
the  sky-line  of  the  Pond  and  embroider 
it  gracefully.  But  the  Lily  Pond,  forward, 
forward ! 

Through  wood  paths  which  spring 
kindly  to  the  feet,  by  and  over  encroach- 
ing sands  blown  from  the  Lake  which  is 
invisible,  though  ever-present  and  preva- 
lent, encroaching  on  what  was  once  a 
logging  road,  but  now  owned  by  sands 
and  marsh  waters,  and,  walk  discreetly 
as  you  may,  you  will  slosh  into  marsh 
betimes  and  more  the  gladness.  The 
96 


wriggling  along,  sometimes  on  the  steep  The  Lily- 
incline   of    the  wooded    hills,   sometimes  Pond 
wriggling  off  into  the  land  of  reeds  and 
then  the  glistening  lilies  awaiting  you,  set 
far  out  in   their  safety  beyond   the  en- 
croaching covetousness  of  passing  hand. 
What  a  journey  and  what  an  arrival!     I 
wonder  if  God  has  left  anything  out  in 
this  poem  of  deep  content? 


"Take  No 
Thought  for 
the  Morrow" 


The  Murmurous  Pines 


The  Pine  Forest 

AT  a  two-mile  distance 
from  our  lake-front, 
banding  together,  is  a 
pine  forest  the  like  of  which 
is  hard  to  find  anywhere,  a 
woods  which  is  quite  beyond 
the  invasion  of  words.  We 
lave  us  in  its  shadows  and 
music  and  lie  prone  on  its 
warm  couch  of  needles  fallen 
through  many  years  and 
years,  and  hear  in  the  tall 
tops  the  booming  of  seas  re- 
mote and  wintry,  and  watch 
the  sunlight  leaking  through 
this  Gothic  roof  and  feel  the 
majesty  of  where  we  are  and 
speak  no  word  save  it  should 
be  a  prayer,  seeing  prayer 
101 


never  invades  any  sublim- 
ity, being  a  thing  sublime 
as  any  earthly  sublimity. 
To  rest  below  the  pines,  to 
see  the  long,  lean,  graceful 
trunks  flushed  as  with 
blushes  soaring  up  straight- 
coursed  into  the  blue  of 
heaven,  standing  very  noble 
and  imposing,  and  holding 
harps  of  many  strings  up  to 
catch  the  fingers  of  the  wan- 
dering winds,  and  holding  up 
so  high  that  there  is  never 
quiet  in  the  pine  harps,  al- 
ways a  sob  which  some- 
times surges  into  a  storm  of 
gloomy  voices,  always  in 
tune,  but  always  to  the  tune 
of  sorrow.  We  are  shut  in 
of  music  when  lying  below 
the  pines.  Long  days  are 
short  as  an  hourglass  drip 
of  sand  when  through  murk 
shadows  as  of  many  twilights 
I  walk  or  stay,  but  always 
102 


delay  till  my  last  moment  of 
delay  is  past,  and  then  go 
with  homesick  feet  out  of 
this  resonant  wood,  where 
hope  seems  stranger  but 
heartache  calls  as  ever  asking 
heart's  ease  and  finding  none. 
Pine  trees, 

"  Ye  bring  dead  winters  fra'  their 

graves 
To  weary  me,  to  weary  me." 

Blessed  is  he  who  can  wade 
into  the  solemn  shadow  of  a 
pine  woods  where  the  nor- 
way  pines  reach  on  high  their 
flesh-colored  stems,  plumed 
with  the  black  music  of  pine 
boughs,  and  the  air  is  red- 
olent with  fragrance  which 
only  pine  trees  know  how  to 
distill.  What  a  pine  fores* 
this  is!  How  isolate,  how 
melancholy,  how  fragrant, 
how  saturated  with  music, 
how  consonant  with  dream- 
103 


'- 1 . 


A  Solitary 


Beside  Lake  ing,    how    linked    to    the    world's    past, 

Beautiful  now  beyond  praise  yet  waiting  for  praise ! 

Commend  me,  wearied,  to  the  comfort, 

calm,  and  rest  of  this  pine  forest.    God 

hath  grown  it  for  comfort  of  the  world. 


Folks 

BESIDE  Lake  Beautiful  are  folks.  Folks 
They  are  plenty,  but  not  one  too 
many.  Old  Dr.  Johnson,  with  his 
fine  coloquial  gift,  had  felt  at  home 
in  this  company.  Wise  folks;  college- 
keeping  folks,  business  folks  tired  to 
the  bone  but  not  too  tired  for  good 
fellowship;  girls  with  their  choice  giggles, 
and  matrons  with  their  white  fascina- 
tors thrown  gracefully  over  their  comely 
shoulders,  and  D.  D's.  with  the  dust  of 
their  theology  washed  off  in  the  waters  of 
the  Lake,  and  folks  full  of  pranks  as  a  colt 


Farewell  to  Care 


Beside  Lake  or  a  kitten,  think  you,  my  friend,  it  is 
Beautiful  not  good  to  be  here?  For  we  sit  in  our 
sweaters,  and  barefoot  and  bareheaded 
talk  and  talk  and  talk.  Who  would  not 
do  well  to  be  where  folks  like  these  are 
gathered,  and  where  on  Sabbath  evenings 
vesper  hymns  lift  their  incense  unto  Him 
who  made  the  waters  and  the  pines  and 
all  the  wide  blue  sky  and  rejoicing  and 
expectant  human  souls  for  their  gladness 
and  His? 

How  a  body  grows  to  love  these  neigh- 
bors! How  they  dig  wells  of  remem- 
brance in  his  heart!  How,  though  we 
meet  and  part  and  rarely  say  good-bye, 
we  hold  their  hands  lingeringly  the 
months  of  separation  through,  and  when 
we  see  their  faces  again  hearts  and  lips 
laugh  out  loud.  Friendship  has  a  stouter 
hold  on  most  of  us  than  we  know.  We 
do  not  put  a  tester  on  our  loves  till  death 
takes  our  friends  from  us  and  will  not  let 
them  come  back  to  Lake  Beautiful  again. 
The  habitual  dwellers  at  this  water  are  to 
us  like  the  evanescent  population  of  the 
summer  time.  They  are  all  inhabitants 
108 


The  House  of  Dreams 

of  our  heart,  and  to  come  back  to  those  Folks 
folk  who  dwell  in  the  city  here  all  the 
year  seems  for  the  world  like  getting 
back  home.  The  world  is  not  big  when 
human  hearts  are  bigger.  In  years  of 
pilgriming  to  this  lovely  land  of  heart's- 
ease  and  sweet  quiet,  not  a  few  have 
gone  not  to  return.  '  Some  have  moved 
to  far-away  parts  where  they  can  not 
come  back  again,  and  we  year  by  year 
find  us  yearning  for  them.  They  should 
be  here,  and  were  we  with  them  we  should 
109 


Beside  Lake  know  how  their  hearts  are  eagering  this 
Beautiful  way.  Love  lasts  and  outlasts. 

Some  we  love  are  gone  a  farther  jour- 
ney, whence  we  scarcely  dream  they  turn 
homesick  faces  here.  We  are  homesick 
for  them.  Would  they  knew  it!  and  per- 
chance they  do.  How  we  should  laugh 
out  loud  to  see  such  coming  once  again 
along  remembered  paths  and  lounging- 
like,  as  in  no  haste  to  go,  but  only  in 
good  haste  to  stay!  "They  come  no 
more,"  is  what  our  longing  says.  "They 
stay  so  long,"  is  how  our  yearning  feels. 

Some  come  not  who  haunted  these 
woods  and  waters  with  a  haunting  affection 
as  though  they  had  been  by  when  God 
made  the  blessednesses  we  here  record, who 
ever  had  wistful  eyes  and  voices  should  you 
in  mid-year  some  time  have  met  them 
and  you  two  had  spoken  of  the  going  back 
next  summer.  And  then  the  grief  to  come 
back  and  they  to  delay  their  coming! 
The  sense  of  sorrow  is  on  us  then  like  the 
sudden  scarlet  of  a  fall  leaf  in  summer's 
prime.  Howbeit  they  fail  us  not.  They 
walk  our  ways  in  imperishable  beauty 
110 


that  they  loved  and  sighed  for.  They  Folks 
add  to  this  summer  place  and  rest  space 
a  lilt  above  the  lilt  of  bird  or  wave.  The 
phoebe  that  all  summer  through  takes  its 
morning  seat  on  the  ball  of  the  hotel  flag- 
staff and  therefrom  calls  plaintively  and 
lustily,  "phoe-be,  phoe-be,"  is  not  more  a 
part  of  the  voices  of  our  summer  land 


Dawdling  on  the  Rioer 


Beside  Lake  than  the  silent  voices  of  such  as  came  but 
Beautiful  Come  no  more.  "The  friends  that  are 
no  more" — we  use  not  that  phrase,  but 
say  rather,  "The  friends  who  are  not 
here."  They  have  their  sunlight,  brighter 
than  we  can  boast  of. 


The  Bend  in  the  River 


Where  We  Snuggle  Down 


w 


HERE  we  snuggle   down   for  the  Where  We 
summer  is  a  lathless,  unplastered    "U! 
palace  of  the  humble,  so  that  it  is 


fitted  to  those  who  dwell  therein.  What 
are  lath  and  plaster  but  dividers  from 
the  weather?  But  we  come  here  for  the 
weather.  We  are  lathed  and  plastered  to 
death.  We  have  to  mount  to  the  summit 
of  our  ordinary  habitation  to  hear  the  rain 
upon  the  roof,  and  while  we  are  mounting 
to  get  audience  with  the  rain,  the  rain 
ceases.  You  have  to  be  a  connoisseur  of 
weather  reports  to  catch  the  patter  of 
the  rain  on  your  domiciliary  roof.  If  you 
115 


Nosing 
Around 


Beside  Lake  are  fleet-footed  you  may,  but  rapidity  not 
Beautiful  being  our  chiefest  characteristic,  the  rain 
has  usually  passed  to  others  before  we 
have  caught  the  chime  in  its  throat. 

So  in  this  dulce  domum  of  summer  we 
rail  at  lath  and  plaster.  We  look  at  the 
striations  in  the  pine  boards  with  visible 
comfort.  To  be  sure,  the  women  apolo- 
gize for  "our  simplicity,"  or  "our  prim- 
itiveness,"  but  women  were  born  civil- 
ized and  can  no  more  avoid  that  kind  of 
talk  than  the  oriole  can  hinder  the  chuckle 
in  his  throat.  Sometimes  the  women  want 
to  paint  the  inside  of  the  house.  This 
roils  me.  Not  content  with  painting  the 
outside  of  the  house,  they  want  interior 
tribulations.  They  do  not  want  the  fire- 
place to  smoke.  They  want  to  go  round 
and  dust  things.  Their  trite  word  is 
"Our  neighbors  do,  or  have  so  and  so." 
What  froth  of  speech.  Am  not  I  a  leader 
in  society?  Can  I  not  set  fashions?  Am 
I  to  follow  the  crowd?  Am  I  not  a  drum- 
major  in  my  own  right,  and  may  I  not 
lead?  I  sometimes  want  to,  but  am  not 
allowed  to  be.  We  may  not  be  drum- 
116 


major,  though  we  may  serve  as  major-  Where  We 
domo,  both  offices  being  spelled  with  Snuggle 
small  letters.  But  paint  the  inside  of  Down 
this  Castle  of  Indolence?  Never  by  my 
vote  or  voice,  though  singularly  enough 
neither  are  much  inquired  after  in  the 
ordering  of  this  establishment.  Things 
are  done,  and  then  I  am  wheedled  into 
acquiescence  by  the  question,  "Now, 
do  n't  you  like  that?"  And  what  shall  a 
man  say?  Shall  he  be  argumentative  and 
rush  to  his  sure  undoing?  Shall  he  stand 
on  his  rights  as  the  signer  of  checks  and 
say,  "I  should  have  been  consulted  be- 
fore the  act!"  I  do  not  quite  know  what 
he  should  do.  That  is  domestic  casu- 
istry. But  what  is  expedient  to  do  I  do 
know.  Expediency  for  a  man  is  a  chief 
word  in  the  lexicon  of  domestic  quiet.  I 
dote  on  it.  So,  we  are  only  partially 
painted  on  the  inside  of  this  Castle  of 
Indolence.  We  are  berugged,  becur- 
tained,  beflowered,  befuddled,  be  center- 
tabled,  beportiered,  and  beporch-lighted. 
A  porch-light  in  a  Castle  of  Indolence? 
Have  we  no  sense  of  congruity?  I  have; 
117 


Bud- 
lime 


Beside  Lake  but  the  porch-light,  there  it  glares  like 
Beautiful  an  angry  relative.  Woe  is  me,  though  I 
say  not  mea  culpa.  I  could  n't  help  it. 
Albeit  the  rain  still  tattoos  on  our  roof. 
As  yet,  no  lath  and  plaster  have  stolen 
our  summer  melody,  though  I  deem  it 
discreet  to  stop  just  here  to  knock  on 
wood.  I  desire  to  walk  and  speak 
humbly.  I  am  a  mere  man,  and  will  both 
walk  and  speak  softly.  We  can  not  tell 
what  a  summer  may  bring  forth  in  the 
way  of  lath  and  plaster. 

Our  hut  (which  is  synonymous  with 
castle)  is  embowered  in  trees.  Here  also 
domestic  tyranny  has  made  life  a  battle. 
I  like  trees.  The  more  arboreal  we  are, 
the  more  simial  am  I.  We  have  a  noble 
oak  before  our  hut,  which  is  the  ladder- 
way  to  a  bit  of  neutral  territory  on  this 
property,  to  wit,  a  little  porch  in  the  oak 
tree-top,  where  hieth  our  friend,  the 
writer  hereof,  and  having  reached  that 
fortalice  standeth  or  lieth  or  sitteth  on 
his  rights,  gets  out  in  the  rain,  feels  the 
fogs  troop  up  from  the  surly  waters,  and 
hears  the  bass  of  the  wave  which  refuses 
118 


to  sleep  or  grow 
silent.  Here  he 
stands  humbly 
on  his  rights. 
The  oak,  lar- 
gest in  these 
regions  save 
only  one, 
makes  this 
front  porch  a 
place  of  seclu- 
sion and  leaf 
music.  On  this 
little  plot  of 
ground  where 
is  builded  our 
Castle  of  Indo- 
lence beside  or 
under  the  wide- 
limbed  oak,  is 
an  arbor  vita 
and  a  beech 
tree,  some  hard 
maples,  some 
pines,  a  fir  tree, 
a  stately  cedar, 
119 


The  Three 
Graces 


Beside  Lake    and  behind,  a  dune  where  grow  Solomon's 
Beautiful    seals  and  bluebells  and,  swaying  luxuri- 
antly from  a  cedar,  a  wild  grape  full  of 
scents  in    blooming  June  and   grapes  in 
stately  September. 

Our  porch  is  screened  in  so  as  to  invite 
the  mosquitoes  to  go  and  banquet  off  our 
neighbors,  and  fronts  on  the  lake  far- 
going  to  the  sky.  Our  dooryard  is  the 
shoreless  waters,  so  I  sit  in  the  hospitality 
of  the  oak-top  and  dream  and  dream  and 
hear  the  all  but  incessant  calling  of  the 
waters.  We  are  not  near  the  lake;  we 
are  on  the  lake,  or,  possibly  with  more 
accuracy,  we  are  in  the  lake.  Much  of 
the  time  we  are.  We  are  sand  pipers  or 
curlews  or  wading  birds  or  swimming 
fowl.  We  bathe,  skipping  across  a  road 
from  porch  to  the  natatorium  of  Lake 
Beautiful.  But  on  returning  from  the 
bath,  I  may  not  walk  straight  in  across 
the  porch.  Nay  verily,  I  must  walk 
around  the  house  and  sneak  in  past  the 
hydrant,  and  come  by  stealth  into  mine 
A  own  domestic  abode!  Am  I  mad?  Not 
Shadow  quite,  but  nearly.  Once  this  would  have 
120 


humbled  me,  though  not  now.     We  can  Where  We 
get  used  to  anything.  Snuggle 

And  when  I  bring  in  driftwood  which  Down 
I  have  freighted  in  my  boat  from  far  up- 
shore,  the  bones  of  wreck  scattered  by 
the  flood  and  brought  hither  I  know  not 
from  whence  by  the  whimsicality  of  wind 
and  wave,  and  pile  the  fireplace  with 
them,  leaving  the  flame  to  do  my  wood- 
chopping  for  me,  then  we  are  buried  in 
indolence  and  luxury.  When  I  bring 
driftwood  and  pile  the  wide-throated  fire- 
place and  set  the  spoils  of  the  sea  afire 
and  watch  the  lapping  of  the  flame,  then 
am  I  in  the  arms  of  romance.  I  am 
burning  whispering  waves  and  despoiled 
ships.  I  sprawl  before  the  flame  and 
pity  Adam  and  Eve.  All  through  the 
nights  the  waves  thrum  on  their  lutes. 
I  hear  them  when  I  hear  them  not.  I 
pillow  my  head  out  on  the  wave's  lap, 
so  to  say,  and  the  thousand  years  of  the 
sea  to  which  my  race  is  natal  recite  their 
runes  to  my  happy  heart;  and  I  am 
comforted. 


121 


Toward  the  Land  of  Rest 


The  Silent  Chimes 

HERE  bluebells  grow.       They  love  The  Silent 
these  dewy  dunes.     The  sands  do  C"imes 
not  affront  them,  but  invite  them. 
In  bosky  dells  where  shadows  are  deep  at 
noon  there  grow  these  blue  beauties,  lean- 
ing demurely  and   looking   at  the  earth 
from  which  they  sprang ;  but  also  out  on 
the  gold  dunes  of  shifting  sands  they  cling 
to  dune-side,  where  every  moment  is  a 
breath   of   wind    and    a   spray   of   sand. 
They  love  to  watch  the  lake  or,  inland, 
125 


Beside  Lake  by  basins  where  no  lake  can  peer  them  in 
Beautiful  hang 


ready  for  the  fairies  to  ring  their  chimes. 
It  may  be  because  blue  is  to  me  the 
color  of  colors,  so  that  any  blue  flower  has 
my  plaudit,  as  the  blue  sky  has,  that 
these  bluebells  are  strangely  dear  to  me. 
I  love  them  all  the  while,  nor  ever  tire. 
If  asked  if  they  were  as  rooted  in  my 
affections  as  violets,  I  should  answer 
no;  but  then  I  grew  up  among  violets, 
and  a  lifetime  memory  is  on  them  for 
my  heart.  It  was  so  that  Shakespeare 
was  touching  that  gentle  flower,  so  that 
he  gave  it  an  immortality  above  every 
other  flower  that  blooms  and  hath  per- 
fume. He  yclept  it  the  "dim  violet,"  and 
puffed  its  immortal  perfume  in  the  face 
of  all  the  men  that  shall  live  and  read, 
while  men  and  poetry  among  them  en- 
dure, saying  how  a  certain  strain  of 
music  came  o'er  the  ear  "like  the  sweet 
south  that  steals  above  a  bank  of  violets, 
stealing  and  giving  odors.  '  '  No  flower  ever 
had  biography  written  to  compare  with 
that.  So  the  violet  may  stay  my  heart's 
126 


chief  delight.  But  the  bells  we  speak  of  The  Silent 
are  blue,  colored  like  the  sky  and  the  sea  Chimes 
and  far  distances  seen  from  a  vantage 
ground  we  love.  It  is  not  that  here  along 
our  inland  sea  there  are  not  many  flowers 
of  varied  tints.  Our  cardinal  flowers 
burn  like  a  red  sunset  where  they  star 
the  marshlands  with  their  amazing  fires; 
and  golden  flowers  cluster  along  the  dunes 
beside  pools  of  hidden  waters,  forgotten 
of  the  sea,  and  water  anemones  are  white 
and  sweet  as  stars  on  calm  summer 


Islanded  in  Beauty 


The  Veiled  Skies 

Beside  Lake  nights;  and  the  wild  fleur  de  lis  are  here 
Beautiful  on  certain  summers  in  profusion  and 
ecstasy.  Yet  withal,  this  land  is  the  hab- 
itation of  the  bluebells.  They  own  this 
place  as  by  aboriginal  right.  They  think 
they  do.  We  think  they  do,  and  so  be- 
side the  waters  and  where  no  waters  are, 
their  cheery  loveliness  abates  our  lone- 
liness, and  we  stay  and  see  the  sky  by 
looking  at  those  silent  chimes  which, 
could  they  be  rung,  would  give  forth  in- 
effable melody.  All  the  summer  through 
these  bells  swing  in  their  humble  steeples. 
They  bloom  and  wither,  and  still  some 
flowers  will  flash  gently  from  a  stalk  hung 
to  withered  flowers  that  a  few  yesterdays 
ago  were  blue  as  the  leaning  sky.  I  love 
to  wander  on  their  track  beside  the  lake, 
behind  the  lake,  up  and  over  the  toss  of 
sands,  down  where  the  wide  waters'  voice 
comes  dreamily  like  a  slumber  song  and 
on  until,  among  lush-growing  things  pent 
128 


in   deep   shadow,    these   pilgrims   of  the  The  Silent 
place  are  still  tramping  by  my  side.  Chimes 

Beside  our  door  where  the  many  pass 
and,  what  is  sad  to  think  on,  where  the 
many  pluck,  a  knot  of  bluebells  hangs 
out  in  everybody's  way,  as  if  they  were 
Christians  that  wanted  to  give  their  hand 
to  all  passers-by;  and  so  we  see  the  many 
pluck  them,  but  never  with  our  liking. 
They  are  too  lovely  to  die  at  the  hand  of 
chance  comers.  They  have  right  to  die 
where  God  set  their  lamps  alight.  But 
when  the  day  is  new  and  fresh  and  all  the 
wide  spaces  are  refreshed  after  sleep,  to 
see  these  blue  chimes  swinging  ready  for 
anybody's  ringing,  makes  all  the  bells  in 
a  body's  soul  chime  out  their  melody. 

These  flowers  were  never  meant  for 
plucking.  They  are  meant  for  hanging 
in  their  little  sky.  They  do  not  offer 
themselves  for  mantlepiece  decorations. 
They  are  fair  to  see,  but  rather  prim  for 
the  indoors,  and  look  out  of  place,  like  a 
small  boy  in  party  togs.  They  belong 
where  the  winds  can  swing  them  at  every 
passer-by.  They  belong  where  the  night 
129 


Beside  Lake  can  lean  over  them  and  hush  them  to 
Beautiful  sleep,  as  they  were  babes.  They  belong 
where  they  may  greet  the  dawn  and  bid 
the  world  good-night.  They  belong  where 
lingering  lovers  stroll  and  where  poets 
hunt  them  out  for  utter  love.  They  be- 
long where  the  summer  forgets  that 
spring  had  trailing  arbutus  in  these 
wooded  sands.  They  belong  where  the 
sky  is  near  and  accessible;  and  so  do  we 
all.  Would  we  could  all  loiter  where  we 
should  love  to  be  and  where  we  belong. 
Sometime  I  think  to  come  on  these  bells 
when  they  are  ringing  their  chimes. 
Across  dim  evening  landscapes,  when  the 
untired  kine  turn  homeward  and  the 
rooks  make  slow  winging  for  their  rook- 
ery, the  chime  of  cathedral  bells  swims 
across  the  soul  like  a  melody  escaped 
from  heaven,  where  it  had  its  hearthstone 
next  to  God.  And  sometime,  when  my 
heart  hath  learned  the  psalm,  I  may 
come  unawares  on  bluebells  chiming,  and 
may  recognize  their  hymn. 

Meantime,  though,  I  hear  them  not;  I 
feel  them  in  the  land-locked  harbor  of  my 
130 


heart.    They  beckon  me  out  of  the  turbu-  The  Silent 
lence  of  the  wild  year.     I  see  their  tiny  Chimes 
steeples  with  bells  hung  at  chime,   and 
mayhap  they  will  ring  some  spring  day 
to  lure  me  back  to  my  old  haunts  among 
the  grasses  and  the  pine  woods  and  the 
dunes. 

Bluebells,  I  pluck  you  not,  but  neighbor 
with  you.  We  are  meant  one  for  the  other. 
You  like  my  greenness,  I  your  blue.  In 
any  case,  we  are  friends.  Nothing  can 
hinder  that.  I  long  for  you,  and  were  you 
as  witless  as  I,  you  might  long  for  me; 
who  knows?  Silent  though  you  be,  I  love 
you  as  I  do  not  many  clangorous  bells. 
Bonnie  bluebells,  cease  not  to  bloom 
while  I  come  back  to  haunt  these  windy 
shores,  which  have  come  to  be  a  beati- 
tude of  my  calendar  of  mercy. 


The  Solace  of  the  Waters 


One  of  God's  Wild  Flowers 


Another  River 

A"  ,ONG  our  shore  and  to  the  north- 
ward   is    another    river,    winsome 
and   winding,    but,    in   all,    differ- 
ing from  the  one  I  have  described.     It 
is    miles    away,    and    the    row    up    the 
lake  to  its  mouth   gives   a   memory  for 
a   whole   lifetime.      How   the   boat   an- 


Another 
River 


Sailing  to  the  River 


Beside  Lake  swers  to  the  oars  as  out  on  the  crystal 
Beautiful  water  it  springs  like  a  living  thing  in  love 
with  life.  And  thus  out  from  the  shore 
on  waves  which  are  sometimes  the  very 
slumber  of  the  sea,  but  at  most  times 
whimsical  with  the  wind  and  tumbling 
about  right  roisteringly,  like  things  at 
play,  the  boat  glides  or  tumbles,  so  that 
the  shore  of  the  long  dunes  is  full  under 
the  eyes,  a  long  sweep  of  gold  cresting  in 
hillocks  seen  afar,  and  black  at  interval 
with  a  clump  of  bleak  pines,  as  if  the  day- 
light had  been  invaded  by  patches  of 
midnight,  but  the  entire  reach  of  the 
landscape  inexpressibly  radiant  in  the 
light  and  glowing  like  Sahara,  so  that  it 
is  never  possible  to  get  enough  of  the 
beauty  of  it,  and  never  can  you  grow  ac- 
customed to  the  glow  and  glory. 

For  many  years  I  have  taken  this 
coasting  tour,  times  on  times,  but  the 
wash  of  the  sea  is  not  sweeter  to  my 
heart  than  the  glow  of  this  dune-glory  is 
to  my  heart. 

It  is  as  if  all  that  shore  were  given 
over  to  a  wheatfield  of  ripened  grain 
136 


which,  ever  answering  to  the 
wind,  yet  never  worried  by  it, 
stayed  on  and  on  the  eternal 
gold,  like  that  on  which  the 
angels  wander  in  the  skies. 
And  come  to  think  of  it,  may  it 
not  have  been  a  golden  wheat- 
field  John  saw  in  heaven  an 
supposed  it  gold?  Who 
knows?  But  who  would  not 
rather  walk  on  the  perpetuated 
gold  of  wheat-stubble  than  on 
a  pavement  of  metal  gold  ? 
The  boat  tosses  and  the  oars 
lift  and  fall  in  rhythmic  glad- 
ness, and  the  pines  and  dunes 
bordering  the  lake  wind  and 
pass  to  the  rearward  and  the 
far-away  approaches  and  then 
slips  like  a  whisper  past  and 
the  headland  of  the  river 
grows  more  apparent.  The 
beauty  of  rowing  here  is  that 
you  are  never  in  haste  as  to 
get  some  whither.  You  are 
approaching  or  receding,  but 
137 


A  Listening 
Shadow 


Beside  Lake  are  always  where  you  wish  to  be.  You 
Beautiful  are  not  on  a  pilgrimage  toward  a  des- 
tination, but  are  at  home  in  the  com- 
fort of  a  wide  delight.  What  if  you 
do  not  come  to  your  desired  haven? 
Why,  no  matter.  You  were  never  out  of 
your  desired  haven.  You  were  in  your 
port  of  dreams  all  the  while.  Nothing 
goes  amiss  along  this  shore,  so  be  you 
love  God  and  the  beautiful.  It  is  rest 
and  glee  and  cumulative  comfort.  What 
care  I  when  I  come  or  whether  I  come? 
I  am  not  on  the  way  to  anywhere.  I 
have  arrived  at  everywhere. 

But  I  ply  the  oar.  Yonder  another 
river  slips  into  Lake  Beautiful  and  is  lost 
in  its  sheen  of  waters.  And  having  bathed 
my  spirit,  all  the  miles  of  rowing  in  the 
golden  glory  of  the  sands  stretching  far, 
which  warms  the  heart  like  a  wood-fire 
in  the  winter  warms  the  hands,  the  boat 
veers  shoreward  and  heads  into  the  river. 
The  current  is  swift,  but  kind.  A  lake 
larger  than  Galilee  empties  through  this 
channel,  and  so  the  river  has  right  to  put 
on  river  airs.  And  it  does.  A  business 
138 


Some  Summer  Laughter 


air  is  on  it,  as  to  say,  "  I  am  not  on  holi- 
day, I  can  not  loiter  as  you  do ;  I  must  on 
and  out.  Time  nor  I  must  linger.  Fare 
you  well!"  And  the  shining  waters  have 
shimmered  away  into  the  shore  music  of 
the  mighty  water  where  henceforth  their 
home  shall  be.  Here  in  other  days  was 
a  wharf  and  here  is  a  pier  built  for  ships 
to  lade  them  with  perfumed  pine  trees 
or  lumber  for  the  building  of  cities.  The 
pier  languishes,  as  does  the  wharf;  but 
139 


Another 
River 


side  Lake  the  sky  bends  and  the  wind  whispers  and 
Beautiful  the  sands  glow  and  the  river  whispers  and 
glides  on,  still  on,  as  if  they  had  no 
memory  of  any  other  yesterday.  And  I 
for  one,  being  no  utilitarian,  am  in  my 
heart  glad  the  ships  lade  here  no  longer. 
And  that  this  is  now  and  shall  stay  al- 
ways a  Port  of  Entry  of  Dreams.  The 
dreams  last.  It  is  always  so.  Our  dreams 
last  and  climb  the  hills  of  life  and  set 
their  pennants  floating  from  every  empty 
hilltop  and  float  them  there  for  aye. 


The  Day  Slar 


Here  is  a  place  to  dream;  and  the  winds 


140 


V:,;".-:-:^: 


dream  past  and  the  waves  dream  in  on  Another 
the  immemorial  strand  and  the  river  cur-  River 
rent  dreams  outward  in  its  thrift  of  time, 
and  I  dream  here  in  my  boat,  which  is  a 
fragment  of  my  dreaming.  Plainly  it  is 
not  midday,  but  midnight,  and  all  the 
world  is  wrapped  in  slumber,  for  how 
shall  all  this  congeniality  of  place  and 
balm  and  boat  and  oarsman  of  the  boat 
be  dreaming,  except  it  be  the  dim  middle 
of  the  dark? 

So  up  the  giddy  current  we  proceed, 
boat  and  rower.  We  can  not  haste.  All 
things  beautiful  beckon  to  us  and  detain 
us.  The  tangled  vines,  the  shivering  cot- 
tonwoods  low-growing,  clinging,  rainy- 
sweet,  the  pines  which  come  close  and 
then  grow  coy  and  wander  back  again 
into  their  ancient  solitude,  and  the  lions 
in  the  way  where  the  snags  gather,  logs 
with  them  and  dam  the  stream,  the 
waters  making  merry  with  this  attempted 
obstruction.  The  banks  are  banks,  and 
not  the  swamp-grasses  wherewith  the 
other  river  rims  itself,  but  banks  meant 
to  include  a  stream  and  preclude  its  vag- 
141 


Beside  Lake  abondage.  A  new  type  of  river,  with 
Beautiful  versatility  of  beauty,  is  here.  It  winds 
and  takes  time  for  its  winding.  A  long, 
slow  curve  where  sometimes  the  waters 
are  shallow,  spreading  from  shore  to 
shore,  and  at  others  where  only  a  channel 
in  the  center  contains  the  river,  and  the 
flow  is  deep  and  insistent  and  the  boat 
can  sink  its  depth  and  not  drag  keel  on 
the  sandy  bottom.  But  always  the  river 
comes  to  some  new  pathway  of  wonder. 
The  mosses  grow  and  strain  lakeward  as 
the  swift  current  goes  gladly  out.  Fish 
flash  their  arrows  in  the  streams.  By  and 
by  the  river  comes  to  a  rapids ;  diminutive 
they  are  and  rather  funny  to  a  man  who 
has  sailed  rapids  and  been  capsized  by 
them,  rapids  such  as  are  rapids  and  no 
make-believes.  But  this  river  takes  its 
rapids  seriously,  never  doubting  they  are 
illustrious,  and  I  pull  up  them  with  great 
laughter,  and  the  waters  bend  shoulders 
and  obstruct  the  way  rapid-wise,  and  the 
glee  is  constant  and  the  summer  sun 
laughs  at  the  sport,  but  will  not  help  a 
little  bit,  being  indolent  at  summer  prime. 
142 


In  God's  Garden 


But  up  the  stream  we  come  by  degrees  Another 
not  caring.  What  is  destination  to  the  River 
boat  and  me?  We  have  no  destination. 
We  have  always  arrived,  when  I  take  the 
oars  and  the  boat  sags  under  me  and 
swims  out  in  sheer  love  of  its  voyage. 
The  sun  clouds  a  trifle.  The  dunes  and 
the  pines  and  the  river  take  on  a  sem- 
blance of  fall  time.  The  winds  croon  like 
a  lonely  heart.  Summer  is  dead  and  win- 
ter will  soon  be  here.  The  yellow  leaf, 
where  is  it?  And  then  the  sun  pushes  the 
clouds  back  and  laughs  out  into  his  open 
sky  and  fall  is  a  thousand  removes  away. 
It  is  all  golden  summer,  and  we  shall  never 
know  mournful  leaf-fall  here.  These  be 
the  tropics  of  the  Valley  of  Avillion.  Who 
was  it  dreamt  of  autumn?  And  in  shame, 
everything  is  silent.  Plainly,  we  have 
shame  left,  which  is  encouraging. 

I  come  to  a  log  dam,  and  there 
is  no  way  for  it  but  portage,  and  in 
the  portage  I  am  turned  on  a  log  which 
has  a  punster's  trick,  and  go  kerslosh 
in  the  river,  and  everybody  laughs 


An  Etching 
of  Nature 


— the    logs    that 


did 
145 


the    kersloshing, 


the  river  in  which  is 
the  kersloshing,  the 
boat  that  did  the 
kersloshing,  and  I 
who  am  the  recipient 
of  the  kersloshing. 
We  all  laugh.  What 
odds?  Are  we  not 
off  on  an  escapade, 
and  are  we  not 
sportsmen  enough  to 
take  what  comes  and 
be  ready  for  more? 
I  should  hope  so.  I 
am  in  water  to  my 
neck,  plus,  and  am 
swashing  around  in 
the  smoothly-flowing 
and  swiftly-flowing 
river.  Here  my  boat 
eddies  and  comes  to 
a  laughing  semi- 
quiet,  anchored  by 
the  same  logs  which 
wriggled  so  as  to 
upset  a  doctor  of 
146 


divinity.  Plainly,  this  boat  is  not  Another 
specially  my  friend.  She  seems  to  play 
truant  with  my  affections  now,  and 
stands  in  with  the  strongest,  as  was  the 
old-time  way  with  women.  But  all  is 
lovely.  Nobody  is  hurt  and  nobody  is 
mad,  and  everybody  is  glad,  and  this 
free  ducking  is  much  to  my  liking. 
Usually  under  the  bondage  of  civilization 
I  undress  before  I  take  a  plunge;  but  this 
has  saved  that  needless  effort.  I  am  here 
in  the  right  place  and  at  the  right  time 
and  in  the  right  spirit,  and  am  saved 
the  trouble  of  undressing  and  that  more 
taxing  trouble  of  re-dressing.  After  all, 
the  good  old-fashioned  way  of  wearing 
nothing  had  its  advantages.  Decolette 
habits  are  economical,  both  of  material 
and  labor.  All  aborigines  love  undress 
costumes,  and  I  am  aborigine.  I  feel  it 
more  and  more.  How  I  am  hampered  by 
this  putting  a  crease  in  the  trousers  and 
keeping  a  crease  out  of  the  coat!  What 
a  waste  of  precious  time  and  precious 
cash,  both,  these  frivolities  are!  I  loathe 
them.  This  just  suits  me.  And  with  all 
147 


Beside  Lake  my  impedimenta  I  am  diligently  applying 
Beautiful  myself  to  not  getting  out  of  the  water. 
I  shall  be  wet  through  if  I  stay  much 
longer.  I  feel  damp  even  now.  But  the 
life-saver  does  not  see  me.  And  no  hu- 
mane officer  is  in  sight.  And  this  dous- 
ing will  doubtless  help  my  sermons;  and 
so,  staying  where  the  rolling  logs  sub- 
merged me  will  no  doubt  prove  a  real 
philanthropy,  and  when  I  can  be  a  phi- 
lanthropist without  inconvenience  or  cash, 
I  positively  dote  on  philanthropy.  So, 
viewing  myself  as  a  submerged  philan- 
thropist adds  delightfully  to  my  impro- 
vised bath.  The  boat  smiles  at  wriggling 
anchorage  by  the  bobbing  logs  which  the 
stream  tries  to  run  out  to  the  lake,  but 
which  utilitarian  man  has  chained  across 
the  stream,  only  to  make  the  waters  foam 
and  fuss  a  little  and  then  to  pass,  and  on 
with  their  outward  voyaging.  The  sun 
is  warm  and  the  day  is  like  rosemary  for 
remembrance,  and  I  am  at  leisure  and 
waterlogged  almost,  though  bobbing  like 
a  cork  and  the  boat  is  bobbing  like  my- 
self and  all  is  glee,  but  have  I  not  portaged 
148 


this   boat   across   these   same   unreliable  Another 
logs?  and  should  I  now  refrain  from  voy-   R*ver 
aging  on  up  the  stream,  as  my  evident 
intent  was,  then  shall  I  be  set  down  in 
the  catalogue  of  the  overcome  by  these 
slippery  and  moss-grown  logs  which  know 
not  how  to  behave  to  a  Christian;   so  I 
climb  into  the  boat  and  seize  the  oars 
and  go  on  right  merrily. 

Damp,  am  I?  Well,  in  a  manner,  but 
I  am  to  that  manner  born,  being  a  sea- 
man's son,  so  that  is  not  thought  on.  I 
am  in  harmony  with  my  environment, 
which  is  a  piece  of  good  manners,  as  I 
take  it.  And  so,  on  where  the  shallows 
are  very  shallow  and  the  river  widens 
out  to  expanse  very  riverlike,  but  has  not 
enough  water  for  the  experiment.  Thin 
fish  only  can  swim  in  this  shallowness, 
and  this  boat  is  no  thin  fish.  But  what 
of  that?  Is  this  to  be  considered  as  an 
impediment?  Not  so.  This  is  a  part  of 
the  lifetime  of  a  stream.  The  water  is 

151  Another 

River 


Beside  Lake  clear  as  the  sky  and  holds  all  the  sky 
Beautiful  there  is  around,  and  shines  and  smiles 
and  wimples  on,  and  I  cease  rowing  and 
push  up  and  push  off,  and  that  is  our 
method  of  leisurely  locomotion.  We 
speed  well  when  we  speed  none.  The 
fun  is  on  where  the  water  floweth  and 
where  the  river  goeth.  Never  was  water 
without  a  picture,  though  sometimes  the 
picture  without  an  artist;  but  God  sees 
what  He  has  made,  and  that  is  artist 
enough  for  the  river. 

Then  the  rapids  swing  and  the  river 
narrows  again,  and  there  is  a  rush  of  fun, 
and  the  boat  sometimes  spins  around  on 
me  and  I  can  not  stay  it,  but  the  end  is 
ever  the  same;  the  end  is  delight,  for  the 
river  and  the  boat  and  the  man  who  is 
soaked,  but  is  now  hanging  drying  in  the 
sun,  are  all  here.  And  above,  where  I 
come  in  my  leisurely  hastelessness  is  a 
dam  and  a  lake  as  ample  as  beatified 
A  Silhouelte  Galilee,  and  there  somewhere  is  a  boy  of 
of  Summer  mine  very  dear  to  my  heart,  and  he  is 
fishing  and  loves  Ike  Walton, 
and  has  a  vein  of  vagabondage 
152 


like  Rip  Van  Winkle  when  the  fishing  Another 
season  comes,  and  I  halloo!  and  hello!  River 
and  an  answering  hello!  and  he  comes, 
graceful  as  an  indian  in  his  indian  canoe, 
with  the  paddle  shining  and  blinking 
in  the  sun,  and  we  meet  and  sit  down 
amicably  to  a  lunch  which  I  have  had 
the  sagacity  to  bring  along,  and  our 
mutual  hospitality  lasts  a  good  while, 
till  the  skies  cloud  as  for  rain  and  we  go 
below  the  falls,  he  portaging  his  canoe, 
and  then  we  friends  of  happy  days  go 
down  the  stream,  letting  the  stream  do 
the  work — the  women  not  being  around — 
and  the  afternoon  declines  toward  night, 
and  a  Turnerian  sunset  spills  splendor  on 
all  the  dappled  west,  and  we  issue  upon 
the  lake  and,  in  sight  of  the  darkening 
shore  sing  homeward,  never  hasting;  for 
the  night  will  not  mar  the  mercy  of  the 
voyage. 

Night  or  day  is  good  on  the  sighing 
waters,  for  as  we  row  the  shore  is  never^- 
remote,  and  we  hear  the  sea-sob  always 
and  the  afterglow  crowds  the  way  with 
glory,  and  the  stars  come  unbidden  but 
153 


Lingering  on  a  Sunset  Water 

Beside  Lake  desired,  and  the  shore  hangs  like  a  happy 
Beautiful  haze  and  the  lights  where  we  have  our 
summer  home  twinkle  afar,  and  we  sing 
along  the  homeward  route  and  the  tune 
we  sing  is  "Happy  Day,  This  Happy 
Day,"  and  after  the  robin  has  said  good- 
night and  the  phoebe  has  said  "phoebe," 
a  trifle  sleepily  and  for  the  last  time,  we 
blackbirds  of  the  night  come  singing  in 
and  the  women  scold  us  happily  for  being 
late,  but  kiss  us  a  welcome  the  same.  O 
happy  day! 

And  as  I  write  I  am  thousands  of  miles 
away  from  that  summer  water  and  in  the 
154 


mountains  of  another  land  than  that  of  Another 
my  nativity,  and  the  streets  are  white 
with  snow  and  the  climb  of  foothills  and 
mountains  is  ermined  and  the  skies  win- 
terly, but  I  see  them  not  nor  heed  them, 
for  I  see  and  hear  and  dawdle  on  the  sum- 
mer river  which  ever  waketh  and  ever 
wadeth  to  the  summer  sea  and  babbles  of 
its  voyage  when  it  comes  past  the  moor- 
ings for  long-sunk  ships  and  invades  the 
fitful  tumult  of  the  vast,  engaging  deep. 


A  Road  Set  to  Music 


The  Lake  Meadow 

BEYOND  our  river  and  beside  our  The  Lake 
lake  lies  a  meadow  lifted  up  above  Meadow 
the  marsh-lands,  where  the  black- 
birds nest  in  multitudes.  Here  are  no  birds' 
nests  save  now  and  then  some  ground  bird's 
trivial  habitation,  nor  are  there  many  bird 
voices.  The  wind  is  the  meadow's  min- 
strel ;  and  the  grasshopper  kicks  his  music 
from  his  joints,  as  if  rheumatism  had  be- 
come melodious.  Hard  by  an  ancient  and 
superannuated  apple-orchard  offers  build- 
ing spots  to  the  bluebirds  and  the  jays 
and  indiscreet  diet  for  the  small  boy  in 
the  summer,  when  his  ailment  baffles  his 
mother's  diagnosis.  But  the  meadow  is 
treeless  save  on  its  inland  edge,  where 
157 


Beside  Lake  deep  shadows  lift  sufficient  for  the  noon. 
Beautiful  fpjjg  grass  is  wiry;  the  bushes  are  make- 
believes.  The  roll  of  the  meadow  is  as 
that  of  a  lake-wave,  while  the  sward 
springs  benignly  to  the  foot  and  the 
breeze  is  always  crisp,  being  on  the  run 
from  the  lake  to  the  shade  of  the  woods 
or  from  the  wood  shade  to  the  crisping 
waves  of  the  lake.  The  grass  is  at  play 
with  the  winds,  and  afar  the  lake  is  blue 
and  tilted  against  the  sky  as  a  meadow 
of  amethyst.  On  the  northward  the  wind 
from  the  lake  comes  summersaulting  over 
the  dunes  and  spitting  sand  from  between 
its  teeth,  while  far-off  golfers  are  seen  at 
their  funny  task  of  looking  up  little  white 
balls  which  are  worth  little  when  they  are 
found,  and  so  the  golfer  promptly  loses 
them  again.  They  emerge  from  one  state 
of  lostness  to  another,  and  grow  not 
weary  of  this  rather  meaningless  industry. 
The  grasshopper  is  multitudinous,  and  re- 
sents human  intrusion  on  this  particular 
meadow.  He  probably  thinks  he  owns 
it,  whereas  he  only  eats  it.  We  neither 
eat  nor  own  it,  though  owning  it  would 
158 


be  fun.    The  shady  woods  at  the  meadow-  The  Lake 

edge  inland  are  full  of  invitations,   but   Meadow 

the  sky  is  so  benignant  and  the  wind  so 

free  and  fleet  and  the  meadow-breath  so 

insinuating,   and  the  top  of  Old  Baldie 

and  its  side  glisten  so  in  the  sun,  like  a 

rampart  of  golden  topaz,  and  lake  and 

sky  and  meadow  are  busy  singing  with  a 

blithe  voice,  "Hither,  come  hither,"  and 

whether  to  swim  in  the  lake  or  walk  and 

run  and  halloo  on  the  meadow  and  watch 

from  the  meadow  the  blue  sky  beckon 

the   blue   lake   into   its   heart,   one   can 

scarcely  choose  between  them.     Though 

why  choose?    They  are  all  ours. 


A  Maker 
of  the  Dusk 


Days  of  Idleness 


THESE  are  days  off.    We  are  never  Days  of 
busy  unless  we  fish  or  lie  (synony-  Idleness 
mous    terms,     nearly).        Here    we 
don't  have  to  do  things.    We  do  them  or 
let  them  be,  as  the  case  is.     And  what  a 
saving  clause  that  is  to  such  of  us  as  have 
to  do  so  many  things  incessantly !    Some- 
times men  come  here  to  fish  as  if  it  were  a 
part  of  the  day's  work,  but  not  often  so. 
We  get  up  or  stay  abed,  swim  or  lie  on  the 
163 

Tired  Out 


Beside  Lake  sand,  go  rowing  or  fall  asleep  in  the 
Beautiful  shadow,  as  happens.  This  is  the  place  of 
happenings.  We  have  no  schedules  save 
on  the  dummy  which  is  our  funny  little, 
dear  little  vehicle  of  ingress  and  egress. 
We  all  love  it.  The  cinders  of  the  puffing 
little  beast  of  burden  that  pulls  us  sail 
straight  for  the  eyes  and  never  miss  their 
destination;  the  springs  of  the  cars  were 
either  omitted  or  spoken  to  slightly  as  to 
their  real  business  as  springs;  the  seats 
have  no  cushions;  the  cars  have  no  win- 
dows; the  system  has  a  jaunty  and  half- 
leary  look,  but  we  would  trade  for  no 
system  of  locomotion  under  the  canopy. 
The  children  love  it  and  so  do  their  for- 
bears. Should  some  philanthropist  offer 
to  electrocute  this  line  and  electrify  an- 
other for  our  comfort,  I  think  he  would 
well-nigh  be  mobbed.  We  want  the  cin- 
ders in  our  eyes;  we  want  the  springless 
springs  and  the  funny  cars  and  locomotive 
with  its  loquacious  whistle  and  its  pudgy 
speed.  It  is  part  of  this  place,  and  woe 
be  unto  him  who  would  make  us  modern ! 
We  love  things  as  they  are.  We  do  n't 
164 


approve    the    mosquito,    but    we    speak  Days  of 
quietly  of  his  faults.    He  is  authentically  Idleness 
of  an  old  family,  and  sucked  the  blood  of 
Adam.    But  the  dummy  is  an  institution 
here,  venerable  and  funnily  jaunty,  but 
beloved  and  spoken  of  through  the  year 
with  a  twist  in  the  voice,  "When  we  see 
the  little  old  dummy  again,"  and  then  a 
touch  of  tumult  in  the  talk  which  drowns 
165 

What  the  Sky  Leans  On 


Beside  Lake  what  anybody  says  by  what  everybody 
Beautiful  says.  I  wish  the  dummy  knew  we  loved 
it.  It  is  a  little  cock-sure  thing,  but  may 
have  deep  feelings  hidden  away  in  its 
steam-chest.  So  to  return  to  this  un- 
scheduled life,  this  haphazard  career  of 
loafing.  We  are  summering  with  God, 
and  must  have  leisure. 

So  we  all  come  loafing  back.  We  seem 
to  have  happened  here.  We  seem  to  our- 
selves to  have  been  away  through  a  long 
winter  night,  that  is  all.  "How  are  we 
all,  this  morning,  and  how  is  the  water?" 
and  things  have  begun.  The  same  old 
way,  the  same  dear  old  way,  and  we  can't 
quit  going  and  we  do  n't  want  to  go 
away.  We  are  hoodooed  by  the  water 
and  the  sky.  The  waves  they  have  be- 
witched us,  until  we  demand  that  there 
be  a  Lake  Beautiful  in  heaven. 


166 


The   Beloveds 

THIS  is  a  home  place.     We  are  here  The 
by  families.     Love  is  mayor  of  this  Beloveds 
community.       If   a   body   had    ac- 
quired a  crick  in  his  social  back,  let  him 
come  here  and  be  cured.     To  see  women 
welcoming  their  husbands,  husbands  kiss- 
ing their  wives,  and  children  using  their 
daddies  for  a  trellis  to  climb  on,  as  if  they 
were  morning-glory  vines,  will  thaw  the 
heart  of  a  grindstone  and  make  a  millstone 
167 


A  Place 
cf  Dreams 


m 


Beside  Lake  sing.  Folks  love  each  other  here.  Christ 
Beautiful  would  feel  at  home  on  this  lake  front. 
They  say  grace  before  meat  at  these  houses. 
They  love  the  pause  and  pulse  of  prayer. 
They  kiss  each  other  good-morning  and 
good-night.  God's  kind  ordering  of  the 
world  is  visible  hereabouts. 

And  these  folks  think  the  world  is 
sweet.  They  are  not  rich.  Some  are;  the 
most  are  not.  And  nobody  is  rich  enough 
to  hurt  or  to  notice.  They  pay  their 
taxes  and  their  bills  and  say  their  prayers. 
We  are  mostly  poor,  but  unconscionably 
happy,  and  have  little  wearying  thought 
for  the  morrow,  but  plenty  of  sunlit 
thought.  Believing  in  God,  praying  for 
and  loving  this  world,  craving  and  seek- 
ing for  His  out-doors,  admonished  by  His 
providence,  each  day  becomes  a  poem 
fresh  from  His  fingers. 


168 


Gadding   About 


HOW  we  do  gad  about  in  this  sum-  Gadding 
mery   world!      Everybody    is    on  About 
the    road    to    everywhere.        Not 
the  young  folks,   so-called,  are  the  pic- 
nickers,  but  all  of   us.       We   get   in   a 
boat  and  go.     Where?     Well,    that   de- 


Ready  to  Gad  About 


pends.  We  go.  That  is 
the  consequential  thing. 
We  go  up-lake  or  up- 
river,  to  dune  or  pine- 
shadow  or  retreats  behind 
woodlands,  and  cook  our 
meals.  This  the  men  do 
mainly.  They  are  the 
skilled  chefs  in  the  out- 
doors, where  sands  blow 
in  the  victuals  and  the 
domestic  niceties  can  not 
be  observed.  The  house- 
hold comes  in  slowly,  this 
one  in  a  canoe,  this  one  in 
a  row-boat,  blowing  in, 
as  it  were.  No  one  in 
any  hurry.  Everybody 
drops  in.  There  is  no 
touch  of  premeditation 
nor  precipitation,  just  the 
sweet  and  swift  simplicity 
of  spontaneity.  And  the 
man  gathers  the  wood  and 
builds  the  fire  and  fries 
things,  and  the  woman 
172 


looks  on  from  her  citadel  of  rugs,  where  she  Gadding 

is  sewing  things  (she  says) ,  and  the  dinner  About 

bell  is  rung  and  the  halloos  all  scattered 

and  gathered.     We  come  and  look  at  the 

river  or  the  lake,  and  the  winds  are  fresh 

and  glad  and  the  landscape  seems  like 

a  picture  God  had  just  painted,  and  we 

say  grace  and  partake,  and  laugh  when 

there  is  no  joke  and  giggle  when  we  are 

most  solemn.    Out  in  God's  dining-room 

with  those  we  love  the  very  most  in  this 

world  is  pure  delight.     This  is  the  land 

of  pure  delight  whereof  we  wistfully  sang 

in  winter  days,  and  we  are  its  inhabitants. 

Lift  the  song. 

173 


The  Pioneer 


Wind-Swept 


A  Morning  Sky 


My  Boats 

WHOEVER  may  be  communist,  I    My  Boats 
am  not.     Frankly,  I  like  my  own 
things.      Possibly,    had    I    been 
other  than   a  minister,   where   we   have 
scant   chance   to   have   anything   of  our 
own,    I    might    have   set   less    store   by 
possession.     As  it  is  now,  I  mildly  gloat 
over   possession.     A  dollar   of   my   own 
charms  me,  though  never  for  long.    There 
is  a  reason.     I  prefer  owning  ten  dollars 
to  owing  ten  thousand  dollars.     Clearly, 
I  am  not  a  socialist. 
177 


Beside  Lake  As  a  man  is  so  must  he  take  account 
Beautiful  of  himself.  Renting  is  not  to  my  mind. 
I  should  prefer  owning  a  shack  to  rent- 
ing a  palace,  so  meager  a  soul  am  I. 
Those  who,  possessing  wealth,  rent  a  flat 
in  preference  to  owning  a  home  perplex 
but  do  not  edify  me.  To  rent  is  legiti- 
mate, so  be  we  ephemeralities  who  know 
not  where  the  coming  wind  will  blow  us. 
To  smilingly  adjust  life  to  its  cramps  and 
entrammelments  is  Christ  philosophy, 
though  never  once  have  I  heard  our  High 
Master  disapprove  the  birds  that  had 
nests,  nor  speak  slightingly  of  the  foxes 
which  had  holes  for  the  housing  of  their 
crafty  broodies.  A  house  possessed,  en- 
joyed, tinkered  with,  patted  on  the  back, 
where,  if  you  wished  to  turn  the  chimney 
upside  down  and  let  the  smoke  circulate 
through  the  cellar,  as  is  often  the  case, 
without  expense  of  inverting  the  chim- 
ney, this  appeals  to  me  as  the  top-notch 
of  human  felicity.  I  covet  possession.  I 
should  build  a  fence  around  a  house,  had 
I  the  house,  so  as  to  be  able  to  chase  my 
own  wife  around  the  premises  without 
178 


her  "tromping"  on  the  neighbor's  grass.  My  Boats 
Domestic  segregation  sounds  good  to  me. 
I  even  want  the  chickens  (the  neighbors', 
of  course,)  to  stay  at  home  on  their  own 
crowing-  or  cackling-ground,  in  deference 
to  gender.  I  want  things. 

Yes,  I  want  things.  I  would  like  to 
own  a  river  and,  had  I  the  fortune,  should 
be  superfluously  happy  to  own  a  runnel 
of  shadow  and  meandering  murmur.  My 
socialistic  friends  entertain  hopes  of  my 
conversion  to  their  nobody-have-anything 
and  everybody-have-everything  theory, 
but  they  will  know  more  (about  me)  when 
they  are  older. 

I  summer  on  a  bewitching  spaciousness 
of  water,  and  the  first  season  there  I 
rented  a  boat.  Stealing  a  boat  does  not 
seem  to  me  quite  ethical.  (I  am  a  min- 
ister and  a  wee  bit.j)rudish  on  such  items 
of  conduct) ;  and  borrowing  a  boat  seems 
to  me  "wery  wicious"  (a  la  Sam  Weller), 
and  I  know  not  any  other  way  to  secure 
a  boat,  save  to  own  it.  But  renting  a 
boat  was  like  wearing  new  shoes — there 
was  no  adjustment  to  my  curves.  Old 
179 

Tracery 


Beside  Lake  shoes  have  accepted  a  man's  curves,  until 
Beautiful  wearer  and  wearee  are  alike  satisfied.  The 
boat  I  rented  seemed  to  eye  me,  but  not 
knowingly  nor  quite  approvingly.  It  had 
a  broncho  effect.  Neither  did  I  know  the 
boat.  Boats  are  feminine  gender  and 
must  be  studied,  and  the  study  is  enter- 
taining, but  lengthy  and  not  always  con- 
clusive, but  certain  general  principles  of 
etiquette  may  be  settled  on  when  you 
know  a  boat.  You  know  its  general  de- 
meanors, and  as  a  body  is  to  take  a  boat 
to  boisterous  water,  it  behooves  him  to 
know  the  general  lines  of  boat  activity, 
so  as  to  be  prepared  for  boat-atics.  Now, 
the  rented  boat  mistrusted  me.  I  think 
it  did  not  distrust  me.  Either  egotism 
or  my  nai've  ministerial  confidence  in  my 
fellow-men  kept  me  from  the  pessimism 
of  thinking  the  boat  disliked  me  and  dis- 
trusted me,  though  speaking  with  all 
charity,  I  am  bound  to  say  that  it  did  not 
look  me  in  the  eye,  but  averted  its  glance 
when  I  looked  straight  its  way.  Now  this 
vote  of  lack  of  confidence  weighed  upon 
my  susceptible  nature.  I  became  reti- 
180 


cent;  and  the  rented  boat  was  never  any- 
thing  other  than  reticent,  so  there  we 
were,  two  unfriendly  friendlinesses. 

You  can  travel  on  a  car  without  being 
injured  by  the  lack  of  amicability  with 
vour  seat-mate,  but  to  be  on  a  holidav 


Boats 


Enthroned 


Beside  Lake  and  out  for  fun  and  rampage  and  have 
Beautiful  the  boat  look  askance  at  you  is,  to  a  man 
of  thin  skin,  frankly  intolerable;  and  rent- 
ing a  boat,  to  me,  came  to  be  both  objec- 
tionable and  impossible,  so  I  wandered 
about  the  docks  and  the  fisher  nets  and 
the  fisher  huts,  preferring  to  buy  a  boat 
some  one  had  used,  on  the  theory  that  it 
might  be  broken  in  to  human  kind,  and 
so  prove  tractable  at  the  start.  For  the 
psychology  of  this  attitude  I  do  not  now 
contend. 

The  Gayle 

I  lit  upon  a  white  craft  built  of  oak, 
and  heavy,  therefore,  but  as  sweet  a 
swan  as  ever  floated  on  a  stream. 

So  thought  I  then;  so  think  I  now.  Its 
weight  was  a  handicap  in  getting  out  on 
the  water,  and  directing  it  against  stormy 
water  with  a  single  oar  was  difficult  be- 
cause of  the  overweight  of  the  boat,  but 
on  the  other  side,  when  it  was  meeting 
with  the  windy  waves  and  battling  with 
them,  it  was  not  easily  careened  about. 
t82 


To  be  frank  at  the  risk  of  seeming  con-  My  Boats 
ceit,  the  boat  was  a  laddie.  Just  how  to 
adjust  calling  a  boat  a  laddie,  when  it  is 
well  known  that  all  boats  are  lasses,  I 
must  concede  to  be  a  difficulty,  but  I  am 
dealing  with  the  boat,  and  can  not  linger 
with  the  difficulty  about  the  boat's  gender. 
Hang  on  to  the  facts  I  must,  like  clothes 
on  to  a  clothesline.  This  boat  was  a 
laddie  and  is.  That  boat  was  as  fearless 
as  Ulysses.  I  am  in  a  predicament  which 
borders  on  a  pickle,  to  sit  in  this  laddie  of 
a  boat  yclept  Gayle  (which  is  the  name 
of  my  winsome  daughter).  This  gender 
business  is  a  difficulty,  anyhow.  It  will 
never  be  anything  else.  However,  my 
daughter's  name  was  the  family  name. 
Gayles  we  were  when  we  were  not 
Quayles,  so  that  caption  will  serve  for 
both  man  and  woman.  Now  I  am  out 
185 


The 


Beside  Lake  of  that  pickle  with  reasonable  grace,  so 
Beautiful  that  though  I  be  a  pickle,  I  am  nothing 
more  than  a  dill  pickle,  salty  but  not 
sour.  The  boat  was  a  laddie;  I  hold  to 
that.  A  fairer  never  floated  on  water. 
The  picture  "Floats  Double"  will  prove 
my  contention.  That  is  "The  Gayle." 
It  might  permissibly  fall  in  love  with  its 
own  shadow.  A  friend  of  mine,  an  Irish- 
man, brought  up  on  the  brine,  and  every 
one  of  his  timbers  soaked  with  salt,  would 
sit  and  look  at  this  laddie  boat  with  half- 
closed,  critical  eyes  and  say,  "That  boat's 
lines  could  n't  be  bate,"  to  which,  with 
maidenly  reserve,  I  gave  blushing  assent. 
And  it  was  a  joy  to  look  at  the  boat, 
whether  it  lay  indolently  on  its  side  on 
the  tiger-tawney  sand  or  rose  and  fell 
and  fell  and  rose  on  water,  crushing  to- 
ward the  sandy  shore  and  leaving  it 
furious  with  the  tugging  wind,  or  whether 
it  be  tugging  at  anchor,  or  whether  it  be 
facing  the  sea,  with  a  whole  sky  of  sea- 
break  and  spindrift  rushing  wildly  down, 
or  whether  upon  a  quiet  lake  we,  boat 
and  man,  row  a  la-leisure  past  sand- 
186 


dunes  golden  as  harvest-fields  and  lulled  My  Boats 
as  careless  of  the  fact,  tempus  fugit,  to 
which  some  one  has  averted  (it  probably 
was  Shakespeare,  that  master  of  tongues, 
though  I  can  not  recall  any  play  in  which 
he  used  those  stentorian  tones,  though 
probably  it  should  have  been,  if  at  all, 
in  "Julius  Caesar"). 

Tempus  fugit?  Tempus  was  not  fugi- 
tive, so  far  as  we  were  concerned,  and 
need  not  grow  fugitive.  If  time  were 
eternally  on  the  run,  as  some  people  sup- 
pose, how  romance  would  disappear! 
There  is  no  call  when  you  are  in  a  boat 
on  a  summer  sea  for  time  to  be  so  head- 
strong and  fugitive,  so  far  as  I  can  per- 
ceive. A  little  more  leisure  at  some  point 
of  the  career  and  a  little  more  alacrity  at 
other  points  in  the  time-card  will  prove 
actually  as  expeditious.  If  time  will  come 
into  this  boat  with  me,  I  will  defy  him 
to  be  flying.  He  will  find  his  wings 
clipped,  and  will  putter  along  and  fall 
asleep  to  the  gentle  swish  of  waves  and 
the  rhythmic  dip  of  oars.  How  I  loved  to 
loiter  in  that  bonny  boat!  We  fitted 
187 


Beside  Lake  each  other  as  a  collar-button  does  a 
Beautiful  shirt.  We  were  of  one  mind.  What  one 
of  us  want  both  of  us  wanted.  Our  moods 
synchronized.  It  was  a  delight.  Which 
of  us  wanted  to  do  a  given  thing  was 
never  controverted  between  us.  We  both 
wanted  to  do  that  thing.  That  was  the 
amount  of  it.  We  both  wanted  to  lie  on 
the  beach  at  the  same  time  and  listen  to 
the  rhythmic  ecstasy  of  waves  in  the  dark, 
or  lie  on  the  same  beach  in  the  glow  of 
the  golden  summer  sunlight  when  all  the 
yellow  sands  were  set  on  fire  by  the  splen- 
dor of  the  day.  From  the  level  of  the 
water  to  listen  to  the  water  is  a  poetic 
thing,  and  differs  materially  from  the 
same  water-music  heard  a  few  feet  higher 
up.  So,  on  many  a  night,  when  the  day 
had  spent  all  its  light  and  emptied  all  its 
splendor  on  the  sky  and  cloud  and  sun- 
set and  afterglow-water,  and  when  the 
dusk  had  with  leisureliness  but  with  in- 
sistence taken  charge  of  the  water  and 
shore,  boat,  boatman,  the  nearby  lapping 
tide,  the  remote  distance,  the  dim  shore- 
land,  misty  spaciousness  of  lake,  a  wider 
188 


Remote  From  Storm 


Lake,  Beautiful  at  Noon 

spaciousness  of  sky,  where  the  stars  My  Boats 
blinked  as  if  newly-awakened  and  not 
quite  awakened,  then  the  boat  and  I 
would  hobnob,  nor  utter  a  word,  I  with 
my  back  against  the  boatside  as  it  lay 
a-tilt  like  a  huge  white  bird  with  a  broken 
wing,  and  the  sob  of  the  water  smote  the 
level  shore  and  whispered  its  way  back- 
ward and  upward,  till  lost  amongst  the 
solemn  but  not  silent  pines,  but  always 
sobbed  to  the  boat  and  me  first.  And  the 
boat  and  I  said  nothing,  always  nothing 
(and  what  a  solace  such  conversation 
191 


Beside  Lake  often  is),  and  the  water,  wistful  and  won- 
Beautiful  derful>  babbled  on  with  the  sweet  gar- 
rulity of  the  angels;  and  we,  boat  and 
boatman,  listened  and  understood.  Or  if, 
when  these  cadences  charmed  the  night, 
I  brought  the  oar-locks  and  the  oars  and 
the  locks  clanked  with  their  living  melody, 
like  boys  and  girls  giggling  in  the  dark, 
and  the  oars  knocked  together  as  I  strode 
down  the  dune,  then  the  boat  seemed  to 
be  on  tiptoe  for  the  spring  into  the  water, 
and  to  call  like  a  'cello's  dusky  voice, 


Shadow  Grasses 


"Ready,  already,"  and  in  we  splashed,  My  Boats 
and  how  we  rowed  or  loitered  under  the 
stilly  stars!  Or  if  I  chose  the  river,  to 
the  neglect  of  the  lake,  and  we  went 
whispering  along  the  sedges  and  under 
the  foot  of  pines  in  dark  or  day,  the  boat 
would  aver,  with  fraternal  insistency, 
"This  is  my  choice."  We  were  still  of 
one  mind,  and  what  is  strikingly  unique 
amongst  the  people  I  have  known,  we 
were  always  of  a  "sound  mind."  The 
last  remark  is  not  debatable,  but  is  in 
the  nature  of  a  syllogism.  Then  when 
the  water  of  the  lake  boiled  and  the  storm 
was  in  stress,  and  the  gale  blew  its  thou- 
sand trumpets,  then  the  Gayle  and  I  had 
tantrums.  Aye,  but  it  was  bonny!  The 
sea-gulls  were  not  more  at  home  than  the 
boat  and  I.  We  swam  not  so  well  as  they, 
but  had  more  fun,  and  the  gulls  are  a 
solemn  lot,  as  all  gulls  by  land  and  sea 
are  bound  to  be.  The  gulls  always 
stayed  on  the  top  of  the  water,  but  the 
boat  and  I  were  more  versatile  and  im- 
practicable. We  went  under,  over,  criss- 
cross, keel  down,  keel  up,  sidewise,  head 
193 


Beside  Lake  first,  stern  first.  Every  way  known  to 
Beautiful  nautical  exploit  we  went.  And  all  were 
to  our  mood.  Sometimes  we  were  soused 
and  borne  down,  but  always  came  up, 
bobbing  and  giggling.  Everything  suited 
us.  There  we  were  the  superiors  of  the 
gulls.  They  always  wanted  lunch,  while 
we  could  well  get  on  without  a  lunch  for 
a  while,  and  joyed  in  the  whole  of  the 
procedure,  whether  it  was  swimming 
after  a  vagrant  paddle  or  diving  after  a 
sunken  oar-lock.  And  all  went  well  with 
the  Gayle  and  me  till  one  day,  when  the 
water  was  choleric  beyond  its  wont  and 
my  oar  broke,  and  ere  I  could  deliver 
myself  from  rather  unministerial  summer- 
sets when  the  oar  had  snapped,  the  bonny 
laddie  of  a  boat,  hurled  by  a  wave,  hit 
prow  first  on  some  logs  along-shore  and 
broke  that  beautiful  prow  which  had  been 
my  peculiar  joy.  A  boat-prow  gets  me 
addled  any  day  quicker  than  any  other 
thing  can  addle  me,  though  the  discern- 
ing many  declare  that  addling  me  is  not 
difficult.  That,  however,  is  carping  crit- 
icism. Nothing  of  all  the  somethings  man 
194 


has  made  excites  my  admiration  as  the  My  Boats 
boat-prow.  I  love  it  to  distraction.  And 
when  I  came  to  the  rescue  of  the  Gayle, 
after  much  cavorting  in  the  waves,  which 
was  not  a  matter  of  strict  fun,  but  rather 
for  a  time  a  question  of  life  and  death,  I 
am  bound  to  admit  the  boat  was  wounded 
by  the  storm  beyond  repair.  I  am  a  man, 
but  could  have  cried  like  a  kid-boy,  yet 
brave  end  the  boat  had  made,  like  a  sea- 
man as  broken  by  the  storm.  Prow  pum- 
meled  by  the  stormy  sea,  what  more  could 
a  seaman  ask?  So  the  Gayle  still  stays  on 
the  yellow  sands  by  our  sea-hut  door. 
Many  have  required  that  I  put  a  price 
upon  the  boat.  I  have  spurned  their 
monetary  suggestions.  No  cash  can  buy 
this  craft.  While  I  live  and  stay  a  disciple 
of  the  seas,  this  first  boat  of  my  love 
shall  stay,  with  the  scars  of  battle  and 
brave  defeat  on  it,  in  hearing  of  the  wist- 
ful waves.  I  have  borne  it  down  on  the 
sandy  beach  and  have  taken  its  picture 
"  Defeated  by  the  Storm,"  and  all  of  oak, 
magnetic  as  a  thrilling  story  of  the  sea, 
there  it  lies  but  does  not  languish.  It  and 
195 


Beside  Lake  I  being  still  of  one  mind,  and  of  sound 
Beautiful  mjncl)  and  love  the  dusk  and  dark  and 
the  sea  voices  and  the  smell  of  waves. 


The  Prairie 

My  next  boat  was  an  indian  canoe, 
the  one  benefaction  the  American  indian 
has  made  the  world;  and  it  suffices.  It  is 
as  lithe,  indolent,  taciturn  as  its  maker. 
Its  shape  hints  at  an  arrow.  As  an  ar- 
row it  can  cleave  the  water  if  it  has  the 
need.  It  glides  with  wondering  and  si- 
lence along  lake  or  stream.  It  has  no 
pulse-beat  nor  any  indication  of  breath. 
Positive  quiet  is  on  it,  as  of  an  indian, 
under  whose  moccasined  feet  not  even  a 
twig  snaps.  To  loiter  in  this  vehicle  of 
silence,  the  pathfinder  of  the  water,  is  like 
whispering  across  the  waves.  Its  build 
is  a  swan  build :  its  prow  lifts  as  if  looking 
at  the  coming  waves.  It  is  not  born  for 
the  lake,  but  for  the  river — the  river's 
winding  ways,  where  river-waters  play 
hide  -  and  -  seek  with  themselves  beside 
196 


All  Ready 

rushes  and  reeds,  in  sunlight  and  shadow.  My  Boats 
So  light  is  the  canoe  as  to  be  easy  of 
portage;  so  sinewy  it  is  like  an  indian 
racer  naked.  Built  of  cedar,  it  is  as  if 
sired  by  the  red  man  in  his  naked  prime. 
This  canoe  I  call  "The  Prairie,"  so  that 
it  reminds  me  always  of  those  wide  plains, 
clouded  with  green  and  sown  to  flowers, 
which  touch  my  heart  and  shall  until  I 
die.  And  so  double  romance  is  on  the 
boat  and  me  when  it  is  so  named,  and  in 
it  I  always  feel  at  home,  born  prairie  man 
that  I  am.  And  while  this  indian  canoe 
197 


Waiting  for  the  Boy 

Beside  Lake  is  primarily  meant  for  haunting  the  rivers 
Beautiful  and  the  trivial  streams,  sometimes  I  take 
it  on  the  rage  of  the  lake  at  storm,  and 
it  sloughs  on  the  top  of  the  running 
waves  like  spindrift,  with  a  flight  like  an 
arrow,  flying  until  for  speed  and  behold- 
ing it  seems  not  boat  but  arrow,  and  I 
myself,  the  boatman,  become  a  fitful  ar- 
row of  the  chase.  T  is  great  sport.  And 
sometimes  in  the  arrow-flight,  canoe  and 
occupant  will  take  a  sudden  skyward  lift 
and  fall  promiscuously  in  regurgitant 
foam,  paddle  here,  anywhere,  nowhere, 
198 


but  all  of  the  crew  somewhere.     Thrice-  My  Boats 
happy  day ! 

But  most  of  all  I  love  the  shadows  of 
trees  and  sedges  of  a  winding  stream, 
where  shadows  and  sunlight  make  love 
together,  and  do  not  notice  who  comes  or 
goes.  So  the  canoe  and  I  may  come  and 
go,  solitary,  neglected,  and  neglectful  of 
all  courtesy  and  company,  as  if  we 
spurned  the  world.  While  I  live  this 
canoe,  or  its  like,  shall  stay  mine  for 
haunting  summer  streams  and  for  falling 
fast  asleep,  like  an  indian,  in  the  sun 
where  the  lush  grasses  loll  indolently 
quiet.  In  the  picture  "The  Prairie"  has 
fallen  asleep. 


The  Snug 

Beside  Lake  And  now  I  have  another  rowboat  to 
Beautiful  succeed  the  "Gayle."  Its  lines  are 
daintily  drawn,  though,  to  be  sincere,  not 
so  daintily  as  that  of  my  sea-wrecked 
boat,  the  "Gayle."  I  shall  not  see  its 
like  again,  and  all  of  oak!  The  "Snug" 
is  so  light  I  can  load  it  on  my  back  when 
I  needs  must,  though  to  be  certain  it  is 
meant  not  for  me  to  carry  it,  but  for  it  to 
carry  me.  But  I  bought  it  for  lightness 
and  spring  of  immediate  response  to  the 
oar;  for  it  was  procured  with  special  ref- 
erence to  stormy  water,  on  which  my  cus- 
tom is  to  use  a  row-boat,  but  to  propel  it 
with  a  single  oar,  while  I  sit  and  face  the 
breadth  of  seas  and  madness  of  them,  and 
under  touch  of  this  single  oar  it  is  really 
flattering  to  see  this  feather-weight  row- 
boat  answer.  A  single  plunge  of  the  oar 
will  bring  the  boat  from  sidewise  to  the 
waves  to  looking  straight  in  the  eye  of 
wind  and  wave,  and  there,  light  as  a  toss 
202 


The  Snug 

of  foam,  the  "Snug"  lies  on  the  crest  of  My  Boats 
an  impending  billow.  Aye,  but  that  is 
frolic !  Or  when  the  wave  is  still  and  it  is 
early  morning,  or  at  shadowy  evening, 
or  when  it  is  sunny  forenoon  or  after- 
noon when  the  dunes  flaunt  their  glory 
on  the  lake,  or  on  gray  days  of  cloud, 
when  the  fogs  wrap  round  you  like  a 
sea-made  cloak  and  drive  in  your  face, 
lingering  and  chill,  then  at  the  touch  of  the 
oar  we  toy  with  the  waves  as  if  they  were 
playthings  and  make-believes,  and  we, 
203 


Beside  Lake  boat  and  man,  imperialities  at  whose  nod 
Beautiful  all  things  became  obeisant,  and  went  on 
with  no  seeming  rush,  but  yet  with  a 
speed  which  makes  the  shore  envious. 
On  and  on  at  gray  of  morning,  when  the 
shore  is  waking  or  the  dusk  of  evening 
when  the  world  is  saying  its  prayers 
sleepily  before  it  sleeps,  how  this  light 
craft  of  mine  pushes  on  silent  as  the 
starlight,  gentle  as  the  morning  light. 
And  "The  Snug"  loves  to  be  with  me 
and  I  to  be  with  her. 

And  when  the  days  are  sweaty  with 
summer  and  I  take  the  woman  of  my 
love,  with  her  sweet  face  shaded  by  a 
breath  of  ragged  straw  hat,  cinctured  with 
a  piece  of  ribbon,  and  we  load  lunch  and 
rugs  and  camp  belongings  and  a  trophy 
of  a  frying-pan,  and  go  leisurely  up  a 
little  breadth  of  water  which  issues  into 
a  winding  river,  and  where  marshes  are 
aglow  with  cardinal  flowers  and  kildeers 
are  fussing  at  intruders,  and  mulleins 
standing  sentry  by  the  stream,  and  I  have 
to  stop  and  pitch  camp  and  kiss  the 
woman  and  put  her  down  at  making 
204 


doilies  or  some  such  like  unimportances,  My  Boats 
and  I  see  a  body,  a  sweet  slip  of  a  girl, 
come  loitering  up  in  a  canoe,  and  then 
wife's  relatives,  with  one  baby,  which 
seems  a  house  full,  and  when  landed  seems 
a  shore  full,  and  all  come,  and  the  women 
are  resented  as  to  the  cooking,  while  as 
chief  chef  and  bottle-washer  I  proceed 
with  the  meal,  and  "The  Snug"  tucks 
its  head  against  the  shore  amongst  the 
bending  grasses  and  falls  dead  asleep,  nor 
cares  how  long  we  camp.  And  I  continue 
chef  and  cook  the  meal  amidst  female 
jeers;  but,  nothing  distracted  thereby, 
serve  a  meal  which  has  been  cooked  with- 
out reference  to  the  skillet  which  was 
brought  along  for  make- 
believe.  But  this  meat  is 
cooked,  religiously  spitted 
on  the  dry  prong  from  a  for- 
gotten tree,  and  the  aroma 
of  juicy  beefsteak  mixes 
with  the  aroma  of  aromatic 
pines,  and  I  am  burdened 
with  the  grandiloquent  feel- 
205 


Don't 
Hurry 


Beside  Lake   ing  of  being  chief  cook  and  bottle-washer 

Beautiful    (for   how  seldom  can  a  mere  man  feel 

"chief"  in  anything):  it  is  then  that  the 

row-boat  becomes  a  picture  of  joy  which 

knows  not  any  cloud. 

The  Petrel 

Then  one  other  boat  I  had.  Alas! 
alack!  the  past  tense  of  the  boat  haunts 
me  and,  to  speak  a  little  deeper,  saddens 
me.  "The  Petrel"  had  been  a  fishing 
smack  which  for  years  had  done  business 
on  the  great  waters.  Many  a  night  had 
it  stayed  all  night  in  the  wet  silence,  re- 
mote from  shore,  and  long  before  the 
rooster  rouses  the  daylight  with  his  crow- 
ing summons  (for  I  still  hold,  despite  that 
play  "Chanticlee,"  that  the  rooster  does 
waken  the  sun.  If  he  does  not,  who  does? 
That  is  what  may  be  called  a  knock-down 
argument.  I  resort  to  it  only  in  cases  of 
extreme  irritation.  But  your  cowardly 
attack  on  the  age-long  authority  of  the 
rooster  makes  me  indignant  or,  to  speak 
with  more  accuracy  though  with  less  re- 
206 


The  Petrel 


ligion,  makes  me  mad.  Why  on  earth  My  Boats 
should  a  rooster  sit  up  all  night  and  wake 
his  female  household  and  be  multitudi- 
nous in  his  crowing  if  he  does  not  waken 
the  sun?  Let  this  puny  dramatic  drone 
become  less  self-important.  The  rooster 
knows  his  business,  which  is  more  than  can 
be  said  for  many  playwrights) .  But  apart 
from  this  digression  in  the  interest  of  a  fel- 
low-creature whose  prerogative  has  been 
invaded,  this  boat  of  mine  has  been 
207 


Beside  Lake  Watcher  through  the  evening  and  stilly 
Beautiful  njgjlt  an(j  happy  watcher  through  the  long 
and  starry  night,  and  with  the  dawn  has 
come  to  port  laden  with  sea  spoils,  and  has 
sometimes  battled  with  winds  and  with 
waves  where  wreck  was  imminent,  and 
the  sailors  drew  in  sail  and  jib  and 
peered  through  the  waves  and  darkness 
and  peered  for  the  pier  or  shore,  lest  they 
should  be  their  sudden  undoing.  I  bought 
this  boat  for  the  memory  of  tempest  and 
toils  that  were  upon  it.  Six  hundred  feet 
of  sail  it  had  and  jib  extra!  No  trim,  im- 
maculate, dapper  yacht,  built  for  leisure 
and  for  looks  and  by  a  nautical  milliner, 
was  "The  Petrel."  None  of  that  for  me, 
who  am  son  of  sea-forbears  and  working 
men.  A  yacht  lures  me  not,  and  any 
craft  with  a  smokestack  or  with  a  cluck- 
ing sput-sput-sput  of  gasoline  launch  at- 
tracts not  this  sea  man.  They  are  not 
boats;  they  are  vehicles.  They  go,  but 
that  is  all.  I  would  rather  be  becalmed  all 
night  out  of  sight  of  any  shore  in  a  boat 
with  sails  than  to  get  in  on  exact  schedule 
time  from  a  little  "sput-sput"  launch. 
208 


Anchored 


And  this  broad-breasted  boat  fairly  hurls  My  Boats 
itself  through  the  water  when  its  splendid 
spread  of  sails  is  on,  and  the  melodious 
prow  (I  say  so  knowingly,  for  have  I  not 
lain  for  hours  and  watched  and  heard  the 
water  swirl  from  the  prow  of  this  sea- 
sailing  boat  of  mine,  and  have  observed 
the  lake  break  into  hemispheres  of  em- 
erald, until  I  well  knew  what  the  dreamer 
saw  when  he  saw  a  sea  of  glass?),  this 
musical  prow  that  leaps  against  the  seas 
and  lives  against  the  seas  and  conquers 
209 


Beside  Lake  the  seas — how  the  boat  spun  out  on  the 
Beautiful  water!  How,  in  rollicking  water,  the 
waves  dashed  up  over  the  prow  and 
doused  us  lying  there  and  watching  and 
listening — watching  for  the  mercy  of  the 
sea  and  listening  for  the  music  of  it! 

And  not  a  little  of  my  love  for  "The 
Petrel"  lies  in  that  I  had  a  boy  who  loved 
it,  too,  and  sailed  in  it  with  a  skill  which 
I  had  not,  and  which  put  his  viking  an- 
cestors and  mine  to  the  blush.  And  he 
and  his  chum  did  set  the  sails  and  he  did 
hold  the  tiller,  and  we  did  float  and  float 
out  while  the  day  shined  bright,  out  when 
the  wind  went  quiet  and  we  were  ma- 
rooned on  a  sunset  sea  of  splendor,  and 
sometimes  wakened  all  night  to  the  whis- 
per of  the  waves.  So  did  this  lad  love 
the  water,  j  And  I  have  stood  on  the 
shore  and  have  seen  the  lad  come  smiling 
in  with  sails  lifted  or  sails  lowered  for 
the  anchorage,  and  my  heart  sung  out, 
glad  in  the  sight  of  a  boat  and  boy  and 
boy  and  boat. 

I  have  at  dreamy  times  wondered 
whether  boat  were  ever  loved  as  that 
210 


A  Home  Run 


boat  was  loved  by  boy  and  father,  but  My  Boats 
no  matter,  it  was  loved ;  and  one  night  in 
a  fog  on  a  stream  a  steamer,  losing  way 
in  the  harbor  and  thrusting  too  near 
shore,  crushed  the  ' '  Petrel . "  O  Absalom ! 
But  I  had  taken  pictures  of  the  craft 
with  my  sailor  lad  upon  it  and  the  winds 
blowing  free  through  the  sails  and  the 
sun  shining  frankly  across  the  boy's  frec- 
kled face  and  standing  at  prow  or  stern  in 
capable  captaincy,  and  the  boat  is  a  past 
only  in  a  dull,  prosaic  way.  In  a  way 
211 


Beside  Lake  more  real  it  stays  for  always  present, 
Beautiful  tense,  full  of  life,  and  spread  sails  and 
broad  breast  lowered  against  the  gleeful 
water  and  the  voices  of  the  seas  are 
eternal  on  its  prow  and  in  its  sails,  and 
the  sails  spread  toward  the  port  of 
dreams. 

My  boats,  two  wrecked,  two  still  sea- 
sailing,  but  all  mine,  all  jubilant,  all 
song,  all  sea-song,  all  tireless,  melting 
melody. 


Friends 
Forever 


The  Headland 

Summer  Anger 

WHEN  summer  laughter  rules  the  Summer 
lake,  then  the  heavenly  halcyon  Anger 
is    here  and    nowhere  else,    and 
storms    seem    incredible.       Our    waters 
here  are  kindly  and  invitational,  though 
that   word    is   to    be   construed    as    not 
meaning  that  Lake    Beautiful   is  not  a 
lion  whelp  eager  for  prey.     It  will  slay 
while  it  is  smiling,  not  snarling,  and  not 
snarling,    but   laughing.       Life    has    no 
value  in  the  vocabulary  of  the  sea.    It 
is  as  the  lion-play,  which  purs  and  tosses 
215 


Beside  Lake  in  playful  paws,  then  lunges  and  drinks 
Beautiful  blood.  The  prey  of  summer  waters  is 
something  very  terrible.  While  the  wa- 
ters laugh  they  devour,  and  no  apology. 
They  are  conscienceless.  We  have  had 
so  few  deaths  on  this  shore  in  many 
happy  years  that  it  would  seem  ungra- 
cious to  speak  harshly  of  the  waters. 
They  have  been  good  to  us.  Why  speak 
of  their  ruth?  Only  two  deaths  have 
made  us  sad  on  this  beach  for  a  dozen 
years — one  a  strong  man  in  the  prime  of 
strength,  whom  a  wicked  sea  whipped 
down  and  drowned,  another  a  lad  who 
had  gone  out  on  a  morning  sunny  water 
to  take  a  bef ore-breakfast  plunge  and  play 
with  the  glassy  flood,  and  I  dragged  him 
from  their  embracement  dead  as  death. 
Bayard  Taylor's  captivating  poem,  "Hy- 
las,"  remains  the  biography  of  the  water- 
slain.  The  waters  do  not  care.  They 
will  drown  a  beetle  or  a  butterfly  or  a 
man  with  equal  smiling. 

When  on  a  golden  morning  the  sun- 
light weaves  golden  cobwebs  on  the  lake- 
floor  and  your  boat  glides  like  a  whisper 
216 


A  Wrack  of  Storm 

over  a  sea-floor  tessellate  with  radiant  Summer 
mosaics,  when  the  wave  barely  lips  the  Anger 
shore  and  does  not  lave  it,  seeming  all 
tired  out  and  about  to  fall  fast  asleep, 
when  the  summer  wind  has  tied  up  her 
tresses  so  that  not  a  stray  lock  touches 
her  cheek,  then  no  storm  scares  us.  We 
have  forgotten  storms  ever  rise.  How 
can  they  come  into  this  sunny  quiet? 
Then  will  a  tempest  rush  on  us.  The 
winds  grow  diligent.  The  still  shore 
booms  like  Gettysburg  guns.  The  wind 
skirls  and  slaps  the  waves  with  wild 
hands  and  breaks  the  spindrift  and  cuffs 
it  shoreward  as  it  were  part  of  the  sky. 
217 


Beside  Lake  In  our  dooryard  on  a  summer  night  a 
Beautiful  barge  was  mashed  into  irrecoverable 
wreck  on  our  bar.  The  sailors  escaped; 
the  wreck  still  shifts  along  our  shore, 
changing  its  anchorage  from  spring  to 
spring,  steered  by  the  winter's  tempest. 
The  mild  waters  become  so  vociferous,  so 
lacerative,  so  drunk  for  death,  and  noth- 
ing placates  them  when  they  drink  the 
wine  of  wrath.  I  crossed  the  lake  one 
night  when  the  morning  shore  was  strewn 
with  seventy  wrecks.  At  the  mouth  of 
our  harbor  in  grizzly  winter  vessels  of 
steel  have  been  pummeled  to  death,  and 
passengers  have  been  saved  by  the  rocket 
and  the  breeches  life-preserver;  and  once 
when  the  storm  was  petulant  rather  than 
angry,  a  ship  in  sight  of  other  ships  was 
gulped  down,  to  leave  not  a  wafted  voice 
nor  a  floating  face  of  the  dead.  And 
once  a  barge  loaded  with  Christmas-trees 
(O  happy  freightage!)  came  not  to  its 
desired  haven,  nor  any  whisper  came 
across  the  silent  waters,  only  for  months 
they  found  here  and  there,  voyaging 
there  and  here,  belated  Christmas-trees, 
218 


howbeit  not  hung  with  happy  children's   Summer 
stockings,  but  with  the  stockings  of  the   Anger 
dead    and    drenched    with    the    salt    of 
women's  tears. 

Lake  waves  are  not  given  to  curved 
lines  as  sea  waves  are.  They  grow  pre- 
cipitous in  a  handbreadth  of  time.  And 
I  have  heard  on  waters  of  no  moment, 
shining  waters  which  could  scarcely  rock 
a  boat,  a  man  call  "Help!"  and  had  not 
some  one  been  near  to  answer  to  the  call, 
a  widow  had  gone  from  her  happy  holiday 
clad  in  widow's  weeds  and  not  seeing  her 
homeward  road  for  her  tears. 


'There  is  Sorrow  on  the  Sea" 


Beside  Lake  I  was  once  swimming  in  angry  water. 
Beautiful  The  breakers  were  very  wild.  The  windy 
waves  crushed  and  crashed,  and  their 
tumult  was  the  voice  of  many  waters, 
through  which  one  would  have  guessed 
no  human  voice  could  be  heard.  I  had 
been  in  the  surf  for  hours,  for  I  am  Viking- 
born,  and  I  was  weary  beyond  my  knowl- 
edge and  was  out  in  a  strange  beach  to 
me,  and  so  found  myself  swimming  and 
making  no  headway  against  the  wave- 
wrath.  I  was  being  borne  steadily  and 
surely  out.  The  breakers  were  having 
their  way  with  me  and  crashing  over  me 
full  of  sound  and  fury.  I  had  sandals 
on,  and  so  had  not  the  free  use  of  my 
swimmer  strength,  as  otherwise  I  should 
have  had.  There  was  the  boiling  water, 
my  delight,  and  it  was  gripping  me  and  I 
knew  it.  Death  was  not  half  a  boat's 
length  from  me,  and  I  was  swimming 
now,  not  for  fun,  but  for  life;  and  the  tug 
of  war  was  against  me,  my  fatigue  mak- 
ing my  stroke  a  random  venture;  and  I 
turned  my  head  toward  where  my  son 
was  swimming  afar  in  the  same  wild 
220 


*&&- 


God's  Smiling 

waters  I  loved  so  well  and  giving  no  heed  Summer 
to  me,  knowing  my  love  of  the  athletics  Anger 
of  the  sea  and  my  strength  as  a  swim- 
mer; but  through  the  hurly-burly  of  the 
crashing  waters  I  called,  steady- voiced, 
"Will!"  and  the  lad  turned  swift  face  his 
father's  way  and,  less  from  the  voice  he 
heard  than  the  set  determination  on  my 
face,  as  he  said  afterward,  knew  I  was 
in  extremity;  and  being  a  powerful  swim- 
mer and  wearer  of  many  medals  there- 
221 


Beside  Lake  for,  he  dived  through  the  crush  of  waves 
Beautiful  which  was  beating  bitterly  on  me,  and 
when  I  knew  not  he  was  near,  he  rose  with 
the  lift  of  the  sea  and  outside  from  me, 
and  his  voice  swung  like  a  bell,  a  golden 
bell,  "I  'm  here,  old  Daddy,"  and  gave 
me  a  shove  forward,  and  then  another, 
and  I  was  safe! 


3r>  r«! 
:r/-x 


Latt/cerf  with  Snow 

Lake  Terrible 

AID    Lake    Beautiful    becomes   Lake  Lake 
Terrible   in   the  winter,  when   the  Terrible 
north  wind   owns  the  waters  and 
the  waves  can  not  be  quiet,  but  anger  at 
each  other  and  crash  their  ice-cakes  to- 
gether like  furious  cymbals  in  bedlam  con- 
fusion, and  pile  the  shores  with  wrecked 
icebergs,  where  the  tumult  of  the  waters 
is  the  bass  and  the  grinding  of  the  ice  is 
the  tenor,  and  the  cruel  duet  continues  for 
days  and  days,  an  orgy  of  music,  and  the 
laceration  of  the  ice  and  wave  is  terrible 
and  eats  the  shore  as  if  it  were  bread  in 
the  fingers  of  the  famishing. 
225 


Beside  Lake  That  this  riot  of  surging  and  sagging 
Beautiful  tempest  could  ever  have  been  placid 
water  is  beyond  a  sane  mind  to  conceive. 
When  this  writhing  turbulence  is  on, 
then  you  feel  it  must  be  the  ravings  of  an 
eternal  drunkenness  of  the  sea  and  sky 
and  shore.  Here  is  one  place  where  calm 
has  never  attempted  to  cast  anchor.  That 
where  in  wintry  rancor  icebergs  leap  at 
each  other's  throats  like  madmen  in 
murderous  mood,  in  summer  little  chil- 
dren play  and  sing  and  wade  to  heart's 
delight,  and  happy  folks  dapple  the  lake 
with  boats  that  sing  like  bonny  larks,  is 
blank  unreason.  This  is  the  landscape 
of  despair.  Here  ruin  walks  with  hurly- 
burly  anger  which  he  mistakes  for  glad- 
ness. Nothing  can  withstand  this  winter 
onset  of  ice  and  wave  and  hectoring  wind. 
It  could  drown  and  grind  into  unrecogni- 
tion  the  armadas.  Pitiless  as  the  waste- 
ful sea  is  this  riotous  water,  where  in 
summer,  balm  breathes  so  gently  that  a 
lute-string  will  not  be  blown  to  a  whisper. 
The  versatility  of  genius  is  on  this  sway- 
ing water.  God  must  delight  in  it  above 
226 


The  Snow-bound  Water 


measure.  The  land  is  scabbarded  in 
snow.  The  deserted  cottages  where  in 
summer  laughter  sings,  forgetting  how  to 
weep,  are  now  in  hibernation.  No  smoke 
drifts  gently  from  any  chimney,  perfum- 
ing the  air  with  the  breath  of  dead  forests. 
No  swallow  circles  by  any  housetop  or 
low  against  the  river  brim.  No  boat 
sprawls  on  the  beach  in  shapely  and  lovely 
comeliness.  No  footprint  gives  to  the 
227 


Lake 
Terrible 


Beside  Lake  snow  a  sense  of  companionship.  Through 
Beautiful  the  bare  branches  of  oaks  and  beech  and 
birch  and  maples  the  strident  winds  leap 
frantically,  and  the  battle  seems  ever- 
lasting. The  pines  and  larches  and  cedars 
are  black  against  the  snows  of  the  ground, 
and  the  gray  of  the  sky,  and  take  the 
storm  to  their  shadowed  breasts  in  vast 
content  and  sonorous  melody.  They  are 
for  the  winters  born.  River  and  swamp 
are  part  of  the  level  lands.  You  can  not 
tell  where  either  is.  The  earth  is  snow- 
land.  The  voice  of  the  waters  on  the 
shore  and  the  voice  of  the  winds  in  the 
responsive  treetops  make  a  diapason  fit 
for  angels  to  listen  to  in  wonderment. 
Here  beats  the  dithyramb  of  the  storm. 
Along  the  wave-beaten  and  the  ice- 
hammered  shore  the  life-saver  makes  his 
daily  round  with  that  quiet  fortitude, 
that  unrecognized  service  which  is  ever 
the  safety  of  the  world.  How  he  walks 
the  beat  no  one  knows,  not  even  he. 
There  is  no  path.  The  ice,  the  snows, 
the  waves,  the  clouds,  the  winds  say  "No 
thoroughfare."  How  he  travels  in  this 
228 


A  Carnival  of  Snow 


antarctic  bleakness  neither  the  stormy  Lake 
waves  nor  the  stormy  sky  can  tell.  They  Terrible 
have  done  their  mightiest  and  malignest 
to  buffet  him  to  death.  But  being  a  man, 
he  defies  them.  A  silent  man  is  the  one 
conqueror  the  elements  ever  encounter. 
I  see  that  silent,  lone,  momentous  man 
making  slow  way  and  sure  through  all 
the  winter  riot,  keeping  calmly  on,  buf- 
feted but  not  beaten,  listening  for  the 
sea-voice  help-call  flung  from  the  throats 
of  men  about  to  die;  and  this  pilgrim  of 
the  storm  and  the  God  of  the  storm  and 
the  pilgrim  and  the  drowning  seaman 
listening  to  hear!  It  is  sublime.  Not  the 
storm,  with  all  its  majesty  and  dominion, 
moves  the  soul  as  this  voiceless,  indom- 
itable man  making  headway  where  no 
headway  can  be  made. 

There  is  ever  the  thrill  of  the  battle. 
Nobody  is  to  be  commiserated  who  is  in 
a  battle,  any  battle;  for  a  battle-breath 
hath  passion  and  power  and  glory.  When 
swords  swing  and  horses  gallop  to  the 
battle's  core  the  rapture  is  on.  And  the 
scowl  and  wrangle  and  onset  of  such 
231 


Beside  Lake   winterly  storm  as  is  on  this  wild  shore  is 
Beautiful   something  to  blow  battle  music  into  the 
blood. 

It  is  silence  that  stabs  the  soul  and  lets 
the  blood  to  the  last  dim  drop.  It  sees 
this  silent  man  in  the  tempest-fury,  alone 
but  not  forsaken,  the  pilgrim  of  duty, 
the  man  accustomed  to  peril  but  not  in- 
troduced to  fear.  I  see  him  walking  the 
beat  of  the  imperiling  tempest.  The  tu- 
mult makes  him  glad.  Then  comes  the 


- 


mm 


The  Pine  Forest 


silence  like  the  silence  of  the  dead  when  Lake 
the  snows  are  deep  and  the  winds  whist  Terrible 
and  the  lake  frozen  and  the  waves 
sheathed  in  the  scabbard  of  ice,  in  the 
long,  hard  calm  when  the  land  is  snow- 
bound, when  from  the  dune  crest  (now 
a  dune  of  snow)  you  might  look  across 
the  landscape  of  the  land  and  the  far, 
shivering  but  silent  water  and  see  no 
human  being,  and  every  voice  is  mute, 
one  empire  of  deserted  loneliness  where 
lake  and  shore  and  dune  and  where  the 
river  ran  and  runs  not  now,  is  as  passion- 
less and  voiceless  as  a  circumpolar  world, 
and  the  sands  of  the  dunes  which  sift, 
though  there  be  no  wind,  are  now  sands 
of  snow  which  sift,  sift,  though  they  have 
no  wings  nor  any  vitality,  but  seem  to  be 
the  breathing  of  the  winter,  the  slow  ex- 
haling of  the  breath  from  the  frozen 
lungs  of  the  snows. 

And  through  this  realm  of  silence,  the 
watchman  passes,  intrepid  as  the  winter 
and  masterful  as  the  sun.  Silence  can 
not  strangle  him  nor  the  storm  dismay 
him. 

233 


Beside  Lake  Although  Lake  Beautiful  is  a  summer- 
Beautiful  ianci  with  most  of  us  who  neighbor  here 
from  year  to  year,  this  regal  winter  rule 
is  only  a  wave-beat  from  us.  At  August 
prime  the  swamp  shrubs  will  set  a  sudden 
crimson  banner  floating  on  the  wind,  as 
to  say,  "Winter  comes;  danger."  And 
the  growing  things  in  meadow  and  swamp 
and  woodland  feel  the  neighborliness  of 
the  winter  fear,  and  their  cheeks  tingle 
and  burn  with  the  rush  of  blood  or  trep- 
idation at  the  onset  of  the  storm.  Swal- 
lows fly  southward,  and  we  do  as  the 
swallows  do;  but  the  drama  of  the  year 
wakes  on  nor  sleeps,  but  puts  the  terrible 
bugle  of  winter  tempest  to  its  lips  and 
blows  its  blasts,  and  the  world  is  changed 
and  is  new  and  tragical  but  august. 


Lake  Beautiful 

WE  boat  and  bathe.  The  water  is  Lake 
cool  enough  to  bring  a  tingle  to  Beautiful 
the  flesh  and  pure  enough  to 
make  washing  a  beatitude.  How  deep 
into  the  wave  on  sunny  summer  days 
a  man  can  see  as  he  leans  over  the 
boat's  edge  and  looks  through  grass- 
green  waters  quite  beyond  describing, 
and  then,  souse  you  go,  as  not  being  able 
to  resist  the  invitation  to  the  plunge. 
Bathing  here  is  a  luxury  and,  wisely  con- 
sidered, is  an  economy,  for  you  can  wash 
enough  so  you  may  take  a  vacation  of 
bathing  for  the  next  twelve  months. 

And  westward,  stretching  to  the  set- 
ting of  the  sun,  is  Lake  Beautiful.  Green 
are  its  waters  in  the  usual,  but  sometimes 
on  summer  days  they  rise  and  swim 
across  our  sky-line  blue  as  skies  after  a 
237 


Beside  Lake  shower.  The  curl  of  breaking  play- 
Beautiful  waves  is  green  as  emerald;  the  water, 
wading  out  from  shore,  is  clear  as  crystal 
springs;  wading  farther,  it  is  green  as 
bulk  grass,  and  thence  stays  this  ac- 
customed green  save  when,  as  I  have 
said,  for  reasons  only  God  is  conversant 
with,  it  floods  blue  as  mid  sea.  This  lake 
can  not  weary  us.  Its  dusky  mantle  of 
twilight,  its  gray  mantle  of  clouded 
weather,  its  emerald  mantle  of  mornings, 
its  patched  mantle  of  rising  winds,  its 
frayed  mantle  of  wild  winds  blowing,  its 
iris  mantle  of  sunset  and  afterglows,  its 
quiet  mantle  of  wave  fallen  fast  asleep, 
its  torn,  blown  mantle  of  wild  storm,  its 
black  mantle  of  starless  nights,  its  star- 
sown  mantle  of  starry  nights,  its  silver 
mantle  of  nights  when  the  moon  swings 
rapturous  into  the  heavens — has  this  lake 
any  mantle  we  do  not  love?  Not  one, 
not  one.  Or  has  it  any  moods  we  do  not 
love?  Its  becalmed  quiet,  when  the  waves 
Folded  Wings  238 


do  not  even  wrinkle  along  the  shore,  its  Lake 
gentle  swing  of  waters,  with  music  like  Beautiful 
trivial  bells  at  chime,  its  blustery-mooded 
calling  when  far  out  at  lake  spaces  some 
riot   has   churned   the   deep   waves   into 
majestical  marching,  its  boom  of  angry 
voices  when  the  winds  are  wrathful — all 
voices  wake  our  hearts  to  wonder  and 
content. 

All  night  the  ebb  and  flow  of  many 
waters  drifting  their  music  through  your 
dreams;  at  morning,  the  waking  wonder 
of  the  wide  water  from  yellow  shore-line 
to  the  distant  sky ;  at  noon  the  lake  lifted 
into  white  crests  innumerable  and  billows 
breaking  on  the  old  pier-head  with  roar 
of  booming  seas  and  flash  as  of  jets  of 
light ;  at  evening,  the  lake  a  shifting  glory 
of  strange,  never-to-be-forgotten  lights, 
olive  and  wine  and  emerald  and  bronze 
and  black  and  pinks  like  those  the  moun- 
tains wear  in  their  distant  hollows,  and 
at  night  moonlight  paving  its  street  to 
the  far-off  loneliness  of  the  black  sky-line, 
a  bewilderment  of  beauty  and  of  joy, 
making  apparent  what  heaven's  night 
239 


Beside  Lake  might  be,  did  heaven  have  such  a  holiday 
Beautiful  in  its  gladness;  or  on  moonless  nights  to 
drift  under  the  stars  with  waters  lapping 
at  your  boat's  prow  and  making  that 
wistful,  melancholy  sobbing  which  lingers 
in  your  heart  all  the  year  through,  in- 
capable of  exclusion,  to  lie  in  your  boat 
and  drift  at  the  wave's  and  the  wind's 
will  and  watch  the  stars  in  distant  skies, 
or  in  the  near  waters  and  feel  them  shin- 
ing in  your  heart,  ah,  but  Lake  Beautiful 
is  fair  as  the  purple  twilight  which  anchors 
along  the  sky-line  of  the  land  of  dreams. 


Farewell 


